Warped
by Deranged Black Kitten
Summary: Had Dumbledore not been so distracted, perhaps he could have prevented this. As it turned out though, Edward Elric was falsely accused and sent to Azkaban and Voldemort was the one to rescue him and gain his loyalty.
1. Chapter 1

_Hello all! I've recently gotten into the FMA fandom (I know, what took me so long?), and being one for crossovers, I've decided to tackle the infamous Fullmetal Alchemist/Harry Potter crossover cliche. I realize that there are a billion and one out there and that I'm only adding to the beast, but I just couldn't resist. I'm writing this fic simply for fun's sake. _

_Now on to some important story notes. Through the power of my creative license, I'm changing some things about the FMA and HP universe, so I guess this fic can be considered AU. **Change number one:** I'm changing the dates of when certain things took place. I'm pretty sure that JK Rowling said Hogwarts was founded over a millennium ago, but I'm gonna knock a couple centuries off that date so that it's more around the fourteenth or fifteenth century. As for Amestris and Edward's whole journey, I'm pushing that back a century or two so that it happened closer to when Hogwarts was founded._

_**Change number two:** Our world isn't separated from Ed's world by the gate, I'm making them one in the same with our world being what lies in the future for Ed's world. So Amestris, like several countries have done in the past, is eventually broken up and renamed into what it is today. At the moment, I'm not sure what it would end up being because I don't think Germany has that many deserts. This change also means that the FMA movie never happened, Ed was able to get Al's body back with the stone without any complications. I'll try and insert these facts into the story for those of you who don't read authors notes, but I felt an explanation was necessary anyway._

Disclaimer: I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist and I don't own Harry Potter.

* * *

**Chapter One**

_Both my grandfather and father were right. The muggles are horrible and disgusting creatures not fit to walk the earth. _

_Alchemy was such a complex and amazing skill that very few wizards, if any at all, had the patience to learn due to magic being so much more simple. Only the most brilliant of minds could achieve anything worthwhile with it, and it was the one thing the muggles had that made them acceptable in the eyes of even the most closed-minded wizards and witches. Even my grandfather, who grew to hate muggles with a fiery passion, respected those of them who were alchemists, saying that they were the best of the best among the non-magical and that someday they may even be able to successfully bring the dead back to life._

_What an amazing feat that would have been... None of that matters now though. The Ministry of Magic is investigating on the matter to prevent something like this from happening to us in the future, but as of yet, all we know is that something spooked the muggles and as a result, alchemists were to blame. It happened too quickly for us to intervene, starting in Amestris, a military-run country that is crumbling as I write this, and from there, it spread like wildfire. All across the world, alchemists were hunted down like animals and killed. The many books and written material on the subject were gathered together and burned. I was thankfully able to save a few of the more precious tomes on alchemy, but other than that, it's all gone. **They** are all gone. Ministry officials have been searching for survivors to take into protective custody, but as of yet, none have been found._

_~Nehemiah Slytherin; November 20, 1791_

* * *

For the longest time, The Gate had been well fed by the energy alchemists poured into their transmutations. Then suddenly it all stopped and The Gate roared Its displeasures at the loss of Its main food source. Only a small trickle of alchemy remained and it wasn't nearly enough to satisfy The Gate's ever growing hunger. For many years, The Gate suffered like this, starving and longing for the days when foolish alchemists would sacrifice hundreds to Its mouth in exchange for power, then one day an old man activated an array so complex and forbidden, any knowledge of it had been lost to the ages.

Or so The Gate thought.

At first, The Gate was so shocked that there still existed an alchemist skilled enough to open Its doors that It simply stared in wonder as the old man shouted his demands. It was then that The Gate noticed that the old man wasn't just using alchemy to power his detailed array, he was using something else. Something that wove its way into the alchemic power flowing into the array, something new and amazing that The Gate had never experienced before.

Intrigued, The Gate prodded at the old man, tentatively absorbing this new power being offered to It. _'Delicious,'_ The Gate decided. Quite possibly even better than alchemy, and it was unrestricted by the rules of Equivalent Exchange, something that might explain why The Gate had never tried it before.

The old man trembled under Its power, but remained strong nonetheless and repeated his demands. He was sweaty and pale, The Gate noticed, his eyes glazed over in madness, possibly due to sickness or old age, The Gate didn't really care either way. Finally acknowledging that the old man was doing this all for a reason, The Gate turned Its attention to the array painted on the floor and watched the twisting _thing_ within it attempt to form into something recognizable.

Human transmutation.

"Please!" the old man shouted, his body shaking, this time from having to keep such a powerful array going for so long. "Bring him back!"

Turning Its attention back to the old man, The Gate spoke, _"Tell me, alchemist, what is this power you use that winds around your alchemy?_"

"My magic?" the old man asked, confused.

Magic? Really now? Long ago, when both magic and alchemy were in their beginning stages, The Gate had decided that alchemy had more potential and pursued that rather than any so-called magic. Apparently, It had bet on the wrong horse.

"Please!" the old man shouted again, tears pouring out of his crazed eyes.

Grinning internally, The Gate decided that _yes_, It would give this man what he wanted, but what he was offering just wasn't quite enough. The Gate needed more, more of his alchemy and much more of his magic. It was _starving._ It hadn't had a decent meal in centuries and It wasn't going to pass up this chance. Who knew when It would get another one?

It soaked up as much power as It could, tearing into the man and pulling more and more of his magic in through Its doors, and as it did, the writhing creature in the center of the array began to become more distinguished, forming from the inside-out. Organs, blood, bones, fat and muscles followed by sickly pale skin. The old man shuddered and moaned in pain, but It needed more, more, more. Always more and never enough.

Then, with one last agonized cry, the old man's body exploded outward, liquefied by The Gate's strength, and all that remained in his place was a core of magic, glowing tantalizingly in the air. Swallowing the last of his magic up, The Gate finished the forbidden transmutation; watching as the bloody array seemed to lift off the ground and wrap itself around the newly-created being's shuddering form, staining pale skin with the array's red markings. Satisfied with the latest alchemic creation, The Gate slammed Its doors closed in the hope that the one It brought back would provide It with food in the near future.

* * *

The opening of The Gate was felt throughout the wizarding world like a surge of dark magic, chilling the bones of witches and wizards alike. Even Voldemort, still a parasitic, shadowed form of himself felt it. It set off magical alarms in the Ministry of Magic and sent Aurors and Ministry officials racing to the source. In the middle of this dark surge, the will of Nicholas Flamel along with several tall stacks of paper and books on his research appeared in the office of Albus Dumbledore.

Perhaps if Dumbledore had not been so distracted by the Triwizard Tournament and Harry Potter's unexpected involvement in the competition, he would have made the connection between Flamel's death and the dark surge rather than assume it was Voldemort or the Death Eaters up to no good; And maybe if Dumbledore had not been so focused on finding out just what it was that Voldemort had done, who it was that entered Harry's name into the Goblet of Fire, and what the connection was to the Triwizard Tournament, he might have thought to investigate on Flamel's death sooner. However, Dumbledore was _extremely_ distracted, and so when Flamel's research appeared in his office cluttering it to the brim, and his will appeared on Dumbledore's desk, the old wizard simply shook his head sadly at the loss of a friend and promised himself that he'd go through the papers at a later date when he had more time. With that in mind, Dumbledore left his office to go help prepare for the first task. The dragons would be arriving any day now.

While Dumbledore was busy taking care of the current events at his school, the Ministry of Magic, still on edge over the Death Eaters attack at the Quidditch World Cup, was left to deal with Flamel's final alchemic creation.

Among the Wizarding World, not much about alchemy was known to begin with. The only common knowledge about it was the ability to create gold and of course, for those witches and wizards who paid attention in history class, the worldwide massacre of alchemists with Nicholas Flamel being the only known survivor. Only a select few knew about things like human transmutation, so it's understandable that the Aurors and Ministry Officials were unprepared for the gruesome scene they aparated on and had no idea just what they were dealing with when they spotted the nude form curled up on the ground.

"Dear Merlin," one Auror breathed before casting a quick spell to neutralize the strong scent of blood in the air. Her wide eyes took in the blood and gore that covered every surface. "What could have happened here?"

"I don't know," another Auror murmured before gesturing at the pale form still curled up on the ground, unmoving and seemingly unaware of the wand a third Auror had trained on it. "But I'm sure that _thing_ had something to do with it."

"That _'thing'_ is a child," the first Auror snapped back, her hands on her hips.

"Don't be so sure," the second Auror said. "Look at those markings. That's not all blood covering its skin."

"Is it even still alive?" the third Auror asked nervously, his wand never straying an inch, ready to curse the being should it try to attack.

"Only one way to find out," the first Auror said, shrugging off her travel cloak as she approached it.

"Be careful, Nikki, it could attack at any moment!" the second Auror hissed.

"Stop being so paranoid, it hasn't moved since we got here," she said with a roll of her eyes. Crouching down next to the pale form, she draped her cloak over it before quiety calling back to the second Auror, "It's not a monster, it's just a young boy." Turning her attention back to the boy, her eyes traveled from his long blonde hair, stained orange in some places from the blood, down to the frown on his face and his eyes closed tight. Patting him lightly on the shoulder, she said gently, "You probably saw what happened here, huh? Things a boy your age shouldn't be seeing."

"Sir!" a ministry official who specialized in forensic spells called over to the second Auror. "The blood definitely belongs to Nicholas Flamel."

"I was afraid of that," the Auror sighed. "Nikki, would you get away from that thing!?"

"For the last time," she snapped, "It's not a _thing_, it's a-"

It was at the moment that the boy's eyes slid open, finally reacting to all the noise around him. They were golden as the sun, and to Nikki, reminiscent of a werewolf's eyes.

"Oh," she said, blinking, before the surprise faded and the motherly instincts took over. "Hey, it's alright," she said gently. "We're here to help. Everything's going to be okay."

He frowned at her, his brow furrowing, before he finally opened his mouth and spoke...

Gibberish, it appeared. She couldn't understand a word he was saying.

"You see! He's speaking in tongue!" the second Auror shouted, drawing his wand.

"Are you... you, thinking it's a demon or something?" the third Auror asked, his wand shaking nervously.

"Would you both stop it already!" Nikki snapped. "He's just speaking a different bloody language! Is that a crime?" Smiling kindly at the boy, she pulled out her own wand and pointed it at his forehead. "Here, let me fix that for you," she said before murmuring a quick translation spell.

As the flash of light left her wand, she realized her mistake a second too late. She only had the chance to see his eyes widen at the sight of the spell and the rest following that happened too quickly for her to comprehend. She could recall him pushing her away and the sound of an echoing clap before a stone spike jutted out of the ground and impaled her in the arm holding the wand. As the second Auror shot off a spell that bound the boy up in magical ropes, she tried to work past her screams of pain that it wasn't his fault, that she had spooked him and he was only doing what he thought was necessary to protect himself. However, any explanation she may have been able to offer were drowned out by the boy's own cries of rage and fear. The last thing she recalled before she passed out was the sight of the boy falling still on the ground, panting heavily, all of the fight drained out of him.

* * *

Cornelius Fudge stood before the magical holding cell containing their latest criminal, a nameless boy being charged for murdering Nicholas Flamel and assaulting an Auror. The boy slept soundly on his cot inside the cell, dressed in a short sleeved shirt and long pants that didn't quite fit him. Simple and grey in color. At the time, it was all they had on hand to offer him. His hands were tied tightly to his sides to prevent him from using any more of the dark magic he had performed at the scene of the crime.

Aside from the red markings branding his body (a clear sign of dark magic in Fudge's own opinion), he certainly looked harmless. Not at all the type to do what had been done to Flamel. Yes, a few well placed cleaning charms made him out to be the picture of innocence, but Fudge knew better. He had seen the photos taken of the crime scene and had gone over all of the reports written up on the event the night before. He knew that the sleeping boy before him was simply a facade to something much more dangerous. A demon perhaps, or some other dark creature they've yet to discover, he didn't quite know what, but he did know that whatever it was, it was a threat to him and the rest of the wizarding world and it needed to be taken care of.

"I want everyone who was present at the crime scene of Mr. Flamel's murder to be obliviated. Only myself and my colleagues who will be present at the trial need to know about this," Fudge said with a quick glance to the wizard standing at his side. The man was a part of his inner circle who specialized in memory charms.

"Yes sir," the man said curtly before taking his leave.

'_The wizarding world has enough to worry about what with the recent Death Eater attack. They don't need to concern themselves with a demon that is already in custody,'_ Fudge thought, frowning down at the blonde. '_And anything the wizards present at the crime scene would have offered at the trial will be written up in those reports._'

Turning on his heel, Fudge left the holding cells to attend to other business.

* * *

The trial went fairly quickly despite a few disagreements between the members of the Wizengamot. While it was agreed upon by all that the boy was dangerous (_demon_, Fudge insisted on calling him) what to do with the boy was another matter entirely. The main problem involved the fact that none of the translation spells worked on him and even their best researchers couldn't figure out what language he was speaking. This led many to argue that the spells didn't work because he didn't even have the capacity to learn English or any other language because his mind was more animal than human, and an animal could hardly be tried as a human.

Of course, this argument led to another argument that they had to be completely sure that he wasn't a sentient being because you couldn't just euthanize a dangerous human the same way you did a dangerous animal. Among this argument was another argument that if it was decided that he is human enough, he was still a child and should be charged as a child. This opinion was quickly squashed after the crime scene photos were passed around again.

Among all this arguing, it occurred to one of the members of the Wizengamot that perhaps the boy had some sort of immunity to magic and _that's_ why the translation spells didn't work. A quick test confirmed the theory and also strengthened the general opinion that the blond was dangerous. A dark creature that could absorb charms and spells better than a dragon's hide could deflect them, and just look at what he did to Flamel! Granted, there were _some_ spells that worked, like the cleaning spells, but the fact that there were many that didnt work was too dangerous to ignore.

In the end, it was decided that Azkaban was the only place for a creature such as this. If he truly was more animal than human, not capable of actual thought and unable to be held responsible for his actions, then the demetors wouldn't bother him and his cell would just be another holding pen. If this wasn't the case though, then he was getting exactly what he deserved. Fudge was sure of it.

* * *

_Bam! First chapter done! Minor facts I may have gotten wrong, such as Flamel's age, just consider it part of the AU. So Im kind of doing the Pride!Ed thing, but not exactly. Im mostly just using his look. Anything else that seems like Pride!Ed (like changes in personality) is simply a result of whats happening to Ed right now and isnt really meant to make him seem more like Pride. Also, I'll be posting this first chapter in the regular FMA section, but by the second chapter, it'll be over in the crossover section (still not quite sure how I feel about the whole separation of crossovers thing). _

_Review please and tell me what you think!_


	2. Chapter 2

_Hello everyone. Here's chapter two._

_I was going to have anything in Amestrian be italicized, but then I realized that thoughts are italicized and that would get too confusing._ So anything in Amestrian will be in bold like this "**Blah blah blah.**"

Disclaimer: I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or Harry Potter.

* * *

**Chapter Two**

Edward Elric had never really been a religious person. Being an alchemist, he believed in equivalent exchange, even when many things in life didn't seem fair or equivalent. He also believed in The Gate, having seen it on more than one occasion, the same way another person may believe in a god or another higher power out there that holds some sort of control over life. He didn't necessarily believe in Heaven or Hell, he'd never seen any real proof of either of them (unless you counted Hell on Earth), but he did believe that there was something waiting for you beyond death.

Alchemy proved the existence of the soul; that even when the body failed, the soul continued to thrive. What else could it have been but Al's soul that he attached to the suit of armor? So if the soul existed, there had to be some place for it to go, a place that it was drawn to when it left the body. Right? Maybe not Heaven or Hell, but there had to be _something._

On the day that Edward's own life was brutally taken from him, this was one of the things that flashed across his mind; that there had to be something more beyond death, that it couldn't just all end. This thought along with many others repeated in his mind as his last breath of life floated away from him, and then...

It didn't end.

But it didn't continue either. He neither ceased to exist nor continued on to some next great adventure. He was trapped in nothingness; a cold, cold, shapeless void. He felt disjointed with no sense of time. A second could feel like a millennium and a millennium could have passed with it only feeling like a second. He had a vague recollection of random spurts of coherency, but whatever happened during his lucid moments, the memories were lost to him when he re-entered the void.

'**_Maybe this is the afterlife,_**' he would think on more than one occasion. '**_What else could it be? But then... where is everyone else?_**'

Then the thought would be gone before he could ponder more on it.

Edward's existence continued on like this for what felt like an eternity until finally something changed. It came in the form of a burning light that in no way felt heavenly or welcoming like the light many people claimed to see during moments of near death. It grabbed at him and tore him from the nothingness.

Suddenly his mind was clearer and he could feel again, but all he felt was pain and a familiar sense of wrongness. For a moment, he was blind, deaf, and unable to scream out in agony. His nerves felt like they were on fire. His surroundings blurred into existence and noise exploded around him. He had eyes, ears, and a mouth which was open in a silent scream. He only briefly caught sight of the transmutation circle surrounding him before his eyelids shut tight against the pain. He could hear shouting, but couldn't make out what was being said.

A spray of a warm liquid rained down on him as silence enveloped the room. He shuddered involuntarily on the ground as what felt like hot ribbons wrapped around him, burning his skin like a brand. Curling up tightly on the ground, he wrapped his arms around his shivering form.

A stillness fell over the room, like the calm before a storm. A part of him knew that he should be happy that something had finally changed. He had a body again, and with a body comes the ability to actually have the choice to do something. He was in shock though. While he had a pretty good idea as to what had happened, he could hardly _believe_ or process what had happened. He wanted to go back to the nothingness. It was what he had become used to and at least there he knew what to expect.

'**_I... I shouldn't _be_... and... and this shouldn't be..._**'

Edward's scattered thoughts were interrupted by the sound of several popping noises. His senses, feeling raw and exposed after being smothered so long in the void, picked up on a new presence in the room, several of them in fact. They spread out around him and began speaking in a language he couldn't understand.

He curled up tighter on the ground, hoping that they would leave. He didn't know who they were, whether they were a threat or not, but he did know that he was in no condition to fight. His body felt weak and useless. There was no way he could take on them all. He was completely at their mercy and would just have to wait and see what they did.

One suddenly approached him, and he tensed up, readying himself for the worst, but instead of an attack, he felt soft fabric drape over him and a hand patted him on the shoulder as a voice spoke quietly to him. He couldn't understand the words, but he could tell they were meant to be soothing. Opening his eyes, he briefly stared at the woman crouched over him before the sight of blood caught his attention. It was everywhere and he realized that he even had some splattered on him.

His breath caught in his throat, but before he could fully panic, the woman spoke to him again in the strange language. Frowning at her, he said, "**Sorry, I can't understand what you're saying. Do you speak Amestrian, or... do you know someone who does?**"

She frowned at him and a man standing across the room shouted something before pulling a stick out of his sleeve. The woman and the man argued briefly before the woman also pulled out a stick. Edward stared at it, curious and confused as she pointed it at his head and said something else. Then, to his shock, light shot out of the stick.

'**_Alchemy!_**' his mind screamed and before he knew it, he had clapped his hands and impaled the woman in the arm. Her alchemized stick clattered to the ground. '**_And here I was starting to think she was nice._**'

The next attack came immediately in the form of ropes that wrapped tightly around him, pinning his arms to his sides. Edward sucked in his breath as terror sunk its icy claws into his flesh, for he was no longer in a bloody room with strange people speaking a strange language, suddenly he was in a small rural town, bound up like an animal on the ground with his right arm missing. He was surrounded by people; all of them screaming and shouting, half mindless from fear, rage and disgust. They were grabbing at him, hands clawing and scratching, squeezing his flesh arm too tight. Then he was being dragged across the rough ground; sharp rocks tearing into his back.

In a flash, he was back in the bloody room. It was almost a relief, but he was too tired now to fight or put up any sort of struggle. Panting heavily on the ground, he closed his eyes. His body was too exhausted to do anything else but sleep. Drifting off, he let them take him.

He slipped in and out of consciousness, unaware of how much time had passed between his waking moments. Each time he awoke, he felt weak and shaky, hardly able to leave the cot they laid him on. He was cleaned up and clothed, and they kept offering him small meals, but his stomach would either rebel on him or the food just didn't help him feel any better.

Periodically they would come into his holding cell and try to use their stick alchemy on him, but it never had any effect on him and they seemed to get more and more frustrated with each try. They eventually removed the ropes binding him and instead shackled his wrists up into some archaic looking device that kept his hand separated and prevented him from clapping. He had long since given up on trying to communicate with them and asking repeatedly if they could find someone who spoke Amestrian to translate. There was nothing left that he could do, the next move would be up to them.

Edward could sense that something was different on the day that they came to take him away. His surroundings in general were a lot quieter and nobody spoke a word to him. He had no idea what was going on, but he had a foreboding sense of dread in the pit of his stomach. He didn't know what time of day it was, he had just barely woken up, when two people entered his cell. They were dressed in the same odd robes that everyone else was wearing. On more than one occasion, Edward had wondered if he had stumbled upon some sort of cult.

Dragging him to his feet, they slipped a black sack over his head and lead him out the cell door. There were more people waiting out in the hall. Edward could hear their footsteps as they traveled alongside him down many halls and through several doors. Finally, they reached whatever destination they had planned because they stopped and something was shoved into one of his shackled hands.

Suddenly, Edward felt a pull behind his naval accompanied by a spinning sensation that made him feel nauseous. He would briefly recall the sound of the ocean's waves hitting his ears before he fell unconscious and anything beyond that was a never-ending mental torture in which he relieved his worst memories over and over again.

His mother's death. The Gate. Losing Al. Losing his leg and arm. Automail surgery. Little Nina Tucker's tragic transformation as well as her death. The chimera. The homunculi. The list just went on. Over and over the memories kept replaying.

And then...

His death...

Trying to fight back without actually killing anyone. They were civilians after all, but... it wasn't enough. His alchemy wasn't enough. The Colonel's fire wasn't enough. There were too many people to fight. Too many women and children, too many normal looking people. Maybe fighting wouldn't have been an issue if it had been a bunch of strong, older looking men and women who looked like they could take a hit, but it wasn't. It was just a bunch of townspeople, the hatred in their eyes burning as brightly as the torches they carried.

Smashed automail torn from its socket. Shredded gloves. They couldn't win. They were overcome.

As Edward was dragged through the streets, he kept wondering if Al was safe where he was. Would they find him? Would they recognize him as an alchemist? Would he ever get to see his little brother again?

Edward's screams mixed with the screams echoing from the rooms around him. He felt as if the life was being sucked out of him, as if he would never be happy again. Hell existed and he was trapped in it. His sleep was plagued by nightmares, his waking moments were plagued by bad memories just as horrible as the nightmares, and when he wasn't trapped in nightmares, he was trapped in a reality filled with screaming and crying where rats would come out of the walls and nibble on his flesh and skeletons cloaked in shadows would wander the halls like grim reapers.

They would come into his room sometimes, the shadows billowing around them, and they would lean down over him, their rotting faces close enough that he could feel their chilling breath on his skin. It was then that he felt the worst, it was then that he wished for death. The bad memories would wash over him and mutate into something more horrific than what actually happened. Suddenly The Gate didn't just take his arm and leg, It took his entire body, and It did it slowly; peeling back layer upon layer of flesh until there was nothing left and he never even had the chance to bring Al back.

Edward screamed until his voice went hoarse and he couldn't scream anymore. Then, during the hours it took for his throat to heal, he would simply shiver on the cold, damp floor and listen to the screams of those around him. He would hear their crying pleas in that same strange language, and he would hear the same words repeated over and over again that he actually began to understand some of it. Soon, he too began crying out the same words as those around him.

"Please! Help me! Somebody help me! I'm sorry! I'm sorry... please..."

There were days when he felt that he really was close to death, like he was standing at the edge of a cliff and all that he needed was a light wind to push him over and back into the void. That light wind never came though. Somehow he would always get a slight burst of strength that would keep him in the land of the living.

Trapped, always trapped in a never-ending hell, and Edward didn't understand why. Why had he been sent to this place? What could he possibly have done to deserve this? He was having trouble thinking clearly enough to remember what came before Hell and after his death, but he could vaguely recall people sending him here. People who dressed in robes, shot alchemy out of sticks and spoke a different language. Possibly a cult of some sort, a dark cult that had grim reapers at their disposal and knew of a passageway to Hell.

"Please, please, please," he would murmur over and over again. "Please help me. **Or come kill me. Get out... I gotta get out. Al! Help me! I can't fight this on my own.**"

No one ever came though, to help him or kill him. Sometimes he swore he saw Al standing in a corner, but by the time Edward willed up enough strength to drag himself over there, his brother would be gone. Soon, he stopped trying to even get up and would simply stare at Al and try not to be happy for the change because any happiness he felt was quickly smothered with the bad memories.

One day though, a change came that was too big to ignore. The continuous misery abating to a manageable level was the only warning Edward received before Hell shuddered under the force of an explosion. It was powerful enough to knock the door to his cell loose and, judging from the sound of running footsteps, it knocked loose the doors to several other cells as well.

It took him a moment to process what the slightly ajar door meant, and after staring at it for a while, Edward finally willed up enough strength to drag himself to his feet. Shuffling over to the door, he leaned against the wall next to it and stared through the small opening leading out into the hallway. Now that he had the chance, he wasn't quite sure that he wanted to leave. Maybe it was some sort of trap where the hallway was even worse than the cell, or maybe it was a test and anyone who leaves will be punished worse than their usual punishment.

'_**I could just... close it, and forget that it ever opened,**_' Edward mused quietly to himself.

"**Go on, brother,**" Al said gently.

Edward's head snapped in the direction of Al's voice to see him standing in a corner of his cell. His little brother had never before spoken to him when he appeared like this, so it must be important.

"**It's worth a try to escape, right?**" Al said with a small smile.

"**Yeah**," Edward said, his voice hoarse.

Determined but wary, Edward slipped through the open door and out into the hall. There were other prisoners wandering about like him, but none of them seemed like too much of a threat, too focused on their own escape, so he mostly ignored them. As he turned a corner, a robed man wearing some sort of skull mask ran toward him. Edward's breath caught in his throat. Expecting some sort of attack and being completely defenseless with his hands shackled, Edward pressed himself against the wall and slid down so that he was crouching; ready to curl up and protect himself if he needed to. The robed man simply ran past him though, completely ignoring him.

Confused, Edward stared after the man. He wore the same robes that the people who locked him up wore, but he didn't seem to care at all that Edward was out of his cell. It didn't make sense. Unless... The mask. Maybe the mask he wore was supposed to be some sort of symbol of him being different from the other robed people; like he had different views and was on a different side; a side that didn't want to condemn Edward to Hell.

The man was too far away to catch now, but maybe there were more like him. With a plan now in mind, Edward headed in the direction the masked man had come from. Passing through a few more hallways, Edward could tell that he was getting closer because the sound of activity was getting louder. He could hear many footsteps running every which-way along with voices speaking in that same language he could hardly understand. A couple more masked people passed him, but they were moving too fast for Edward to grab their attention, so he simply continued on to the heart of all the action.

Turning yet another corner, Edward finally reached his destination. It looked as if an explosion had gone off, blowing out the walls of several cells and exposing them to the choppy ocean outside. There were a few masked and robed men scattered about the room, but it was the man that they were taking orders from that gained Ed's attention the most.

"**A chimera**," Edward breathed, his eyes wide with shock. Yet, oddly enough, he felt no fear at the sight of this chimera, for although the man had taken on many frightening features of whatever reptile he had been merged with, Edward knew from experience that not all chimeras were bad. Some were just people that had fallen victim to the wrong end of alchemy. The chimera was something familiar in this world of unfamiliar things and Edward couldn't help but feel comforted by this.

Before Edward even knew what he was doing, he had stumbled over to the chimera and fell to his knees at the reptilian man's feet. He still felt so weak and all of the walking he had done had eaten up any energy he had left.

Grasping at the chimera's robes, Edward remembered the words he had learned while trapped in Hell and said, "Please... please help me... **and then maybe... I could help you...**"

* * *

Lord Voldemort hadn't been planning on breaking into Azkaban until later, preferably _after_ the public knew of his return, but too many of his loyal followers had been locked up while he was out of commission and if he planned on getting anything done, he'd need them at his side. It was fairly easy to get the dementors on his side, and once that was taken care of, the rest of the prison break would be easy.

They entered Azkaban with a bang, taking out a good portion of the wall on a side where none of his followers were locked up. Once they were in, Voldemort sent the Death Eaters he had brought with him to go collect the rest of his wayward brood. As he waited for them to return, one of the prisoners had the audacity to grab hold of his robes, although he wasn't too surprised considering that more than half the people in Azkaban were out of their minds. The Death Eaters still in the room tensed, but Voldemort waved them off, he was perfectly capable of defending himself.

The prisoner was a young boy and although Voldemort was mildly curious as to what a young boy was doing in Azkaban, he wasn't curious enough to spare the child. He drew his wand, ready to kill the blond and be done with it.

As the boy pleaded for help and then babbled something in some other language, Voldemort paused, but it wasn't because of the different language the boy spoke, it was because of the red markings. At first he had dismissed them as tattoos, but looking at them longer, he noticed that there was something very familiar about them, he just couldn't quite remember what. That's when he saw it. There on the boy's left shoulder, exposed to the cold through a rip in his tattered shirt, was a mark that connected all of the pieces in his mind.

"The ouroboros," Voldemort whispered. "Then those markings..."

The boy's eyes slid shut as he slumped to the ground; falling unconscious at Voldemort's feet. The Dark Lord holstered his wand before leaning over the boy to get a closer look at the red markings.

"Not a tattoo," he murmured to himself. "But a transmutation circle."

Or at least parts of it. Although it wasn't completely intact, Voldemort could recognize some key symbols that were used in many alchemy arrays.

'_A homunculus,_' Voldemort realized. '_But what is a homunculus doing in Azkaban and how did the Ministry get their hands on it?_'

Voldemort had learned about alchemy and homunculi long ago when he was still a student at Hogwarts. His interest in the subject had all started when Nicholas Flamel came to one of Slughorn's parties and had revealed quite a bit of interesting information after having one too many drinks. After getting as much information out of Flamel as he could, Voldemort did his own research with the intention of learning how to use alchemy himself. He was never able to perform it though and quickly lost interest.

That was a long time ago and he'd have to refresh his memory on the subject, but he did remember the specifics about homunculi; that they were dangerous creatures created from an unsuccessful attempt at bringing someone back to life through human transmutation. They were powerful, nearly indestructible, and they all had some sort of special ability. Something like that would be the perfect weapon for his side in this war he was fighting.

However, looking down at the pathetic child before him, Voldemort had to wonder how much of that information he read about homunculi was true.

'_If any of it is true, it'd be worth it to have him on my side,_' he thought, a devious smile spreading across his face.

"My Lord?" one of his followers, Lucius Malfoy, questioned, his eyes traveling from the boy on the floor up to Voldemort.

"Malfoy," Voldemort said, "your wife is an efficient healer, is she not?"

"Yes, my Lord," Lucius said.

"Good. I have new orders for you," Voldemort said. "Take this boy home to your wife. Set him up in one of your guest rooms and see to it that she patches him up. I'll be by to check on him later. Also, get me any file the Ministry has on him."

Lucius looked confused, but wisely chose not to question the orders.

"Yes, my Lord," he said before walking over to the boy and slinging him over his shoulder. Turning quickly in place, Lucius aparrated the boy away with him to Malfoy Manor.

* * *

_That's all for chapter two! Tell me what you think and review please!_


	3. Chapter 3

_Hey everyone. Sorry for the long delay, but college is keeping me continuously busy and I don't get a summer vacation. With all the homework I get, updates will unfortunately be few and far between._

_However, I would like to thank everyone for all of their wonderful reviews. I'm glad you're enjoying things so far. Hopefully I'm not confusing you all too much with the plot. I have the tendency to overcomplicate things. To answer one particular question about pairings: truthfully, I didn't really have _any_ pairings in mind for the story; slash or het (which would make this gen, right?), but feel free to make any suggestions. My crazy mind might just come up with something to add to the overall plot. _

Disclaimer: I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist or Harry Potter.

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**Chapter Three**

Narcissa Malfoy was worried. Her husband had gone off on a raid to Azkaban earlier that night to help the Dark Lord free many of his loyal followers. She hadn't been expecting him back for quite a while and had resigned herself to a night spent alone in her room with a bottle of wine, fruitlessly attempting to drink away her fears for his safety. Draco was acting similarly. He had shut himself up in his room not too long ago, just as he did every night this summer when Lucius went out on a dangerous mission, and Narcissa didn't expect to see either of them until sometime the next morning. Hopefully they'd be able to have breakfast together.

However, the night did not progress as it usually did and she had only been halfway through her first glass of wine when one of the house elves informed her of her husband's return and that he was requesting her presence. Walking briskly, she met up with him in the hallway leading away from the mansion's personal apparition point; an apparition point that could be locked or unlocked by only a Malfoy or the Dark Lord himself. Slung over his shoulder was a young boy and for a moment, Narcissa feared that it was Draco, that he had snuck out and followed Lucius to the raid and had gotten hurt, but then she saw that the hair was much too long and more golden in color than Draco's platinum blond. Releasing a small sigh of relief, she followed after her husband.

He led her to one of their many guest rooms, one that actually wasn't too far from Draco's room. Striding into the room, Lucius lay the boy out on the bed, frowning as he did so. Narcissa approached the bed for a closer look, wondering who the boy was and just why did her husband bring him to their home.

"The Dark Lord wants you to heal him," Lucius said, speaking for the first time.

It wasn't much of an explanation at all and Narcissa turned to her husband, waiting for him to elaborate. It seemed to her husband, however, that as long as the sentence contained the words 'the Dark Lord wants,' than that was enough of a reason for him and was all that needed to be known. He turned on his heal to leave.

"Lucius," she protested, not about to let her husband brush her off like one of the Dark Lord's weaker minions.

"The Dark Lord said he'd be stopping by sometime later to check up on how the boy's healing," Lucius said, cutting off anything she had been about to say. "I'm not sure how soon 'later' is," he said quietly, the underlying words standing out loud and clear to her.

'_You better get to healing. We don't want to make him mad, now do we?_'

"Yes, of course," she said, her eyes traveling from her husband to the boy.

"I have other matters to attend to," Lucius said. "I'll be back when I can."

Then he left her on her own to take care of the boy that the Dark Lord had some strange interest in. As she removed the shackles that bound his wrists apart and cleaned him up as best as she could with several cleaning charms, she wondered if it had something to do with the tattoos decorating his body.

Her lips pursed as she stared distastefully at the rags he wore. With a quick flick of her wand, she mended and cleaned those too. They still didn't look suitable for _any_ human to be wearing, but it would have to do until something better was found. At the moment though, his clothing was the least of her concern. The boy could hardly be called a picture of health. He was far too skinny and looked as if he hadn't seen the light of day in years. Starving vampires looked healthier than he did. The dark circles under his eyes suggested inadequate sleep and his labored breathing was something to be concerned about.

Looking down at the boy, Narcissa was reminded of a time when Draco was still very young and glowed with an innocence only a child could have. There had been several incidents during this time when Draco had found a sick or injured animal out on the Manor's grounds and brought it inside to her to try and save it. It was never anything dangerous. Mostly just birds, rabbits, and that one instance with a snake. Narcissa also remembered how most of those animals never made it through the night. With all the knowledge witches and wizards had in medical magic, some things just couldn't be saved.

In _this_ case however, failure wasn't an option. The Dark Lord wanted to keep the boy alive and Narcissa shuddered to think of the consequences that would befall her family if the blond perished under her watch. With that in mind, she set about the arduous task of healing all that ailed her latest patient.

Or at least she tried. A few hours later found her unsuccessful in her attempts. She had tried every healing spell that she knew, but nothing seemed to work on the boy. She could barely even get a reading on his health with what should have been a fairly simple diagnosis spell. It was as if something was blocking the spell or interfering with it. The only thing she could make out from the spell was that he was malnourished (something that she could clearly see with her own two eyes) and that he was getting increasingly weaker as time passed. Narcissa couldn't understand it. If she had been able to clean the dirt and grime off of the boy with magic, then why couldn't she heal him with magic?

After many more failed attempts at helping the blond, Narcissa found herself sitting on the edge of the bed, feeling both irritated and concerned as she stared down at him. She was concerned, not for the mysterious boy, but for her family and the possibility that her being unable to heal the blond would reflect negatively on them all in the Dark Lord's eyes. She was also irritated with the situation in general; with the boy that refused to heal, with the Dark Lord for giving her such an impossible task, and with Lucius for dumping this burden in her home and brushing her off quickly afterwards.

There was nothing left that she could do. She didn't have the right potions on hand to help with the malnourishment (at this point, she wasn't even sure if potions would work), and she didn't know what other potions to give him because she couldn't get a clear reading as to what was wrong with him. She would just have to wait for the Dark Lord and see what his reaction is. Her only hope was that Draco would stay in his room when the serpentine man showed up.

Narcissa found herself pacing the guest room early into the morning when the Dark Lord showed up. She hadn't even attempted to sleep, knowing that her mind would be far too restless with worry to let her. It was still dark out when he seemed to emerge from the shadows and glide into the guestroom.

"How is he?" the Dark Lord hissed as he swept over to the bed.

"My Lord," Narcissa said, lowering her head submissively at the sight of his frown. "I apologize, but I was unable to heal him. Aside from my cleaning spells, none of my magic worked on him."

His frown deepened as his eyes slid over to her. For a long while he didn't speak, simply staring at her, and Narcissa feared the worst. However, before he came to whatever decision he had been thinking about, Lucius rushed into the room with a folder filled with papers.

"My Lord," he said, sounding out of breath. "Forgive me for interrupting, but I thought it important that you know. According to the Ministry's file on the boy, he is _immune_ to magic."

'_At least partly immune,_' Narcissa thought, holding in a sigh of relief; thankful that she couldn't be held at fault for being unable to heal the boy and hoping that the Dark Lord saw it that way too. Her husband may seem cold to her at times, but he truly did love her and after reading about the boy's immunity to magic, he had probably realized the danger she had been in with the impossible task of healing a boy that couldn't be healed. At least not with magic.

"Lucius," The Dark Lord hissed, still frowning. "I never gave you permission to look through those files."

Narcissa's relief vanished.

"Yes, my Lord, I apologize," Lucius said, ducking his head. "To find the file, I had to figure out just which Azkaban prisoner I was looking for. Delores Umbridge pointed me in the right direction. She had been one of the ones present during the boy's trial and she pointed out that interesting fact to me when I asked about him. I, of course, obliviated her after my inquiry, and I only looked into the file to confirm that fact for myself. I promise I read nothing else."

The Dark Lord's frown disappeared, his face expressionless, and another silence fell over the room. Neither Malfoy dared to breath. Finally, he spoke.

"Leave, both of you," he ordered.

Both husband and wife hurried out of the room without looking back, being sure to close the door behind themselves. Voldemort cast a silencing charm on the room after they left, but it was simply a precaution as he was sure that nobody present in the Malfoy Manor would dare to cross him by eavesdropping. With the Ministry's file in hand, Voldemort turned back to the boy laying on the bed and studied him curiously. An immunity to magic, if such a rumor was true, would definitely be beneficial to him.

Flipping open the boy's file, Voldemort scanned through the information. There wasn't a lot there. The Ministry clearly had no idea what they were dealing with. The boy was listed as an unknown dark creature that spoke an alien language that none of their translators could figure out. He was described as being able to perform dark magic simply by clapping. However, just what sort of dark magic he could do wasn't explained. All that it said was that he had injured an Auror in this way. The immunity was also mentioned in the file, as were several spells that did, for whatever reason, work on him.

Little facts, like his name and age weren't mentioned, but there were some interesting tidbits of information, such as the fact that, according to the Ministry, he had murdered Nicholas Flamel. Based on the description of the crime scene, Voldemort couldn't be sure if the boy did or did not kill Flamel, but one thing that he was certain of was that Flamel was the boy's creator. Homunculi were alchemy-made, after all, and who better to pull off such a feat than the world's most powerful alchemist? Voldemort couldn't help but feel amused by the fact that Flamel, a goody-goody just like Dumbledore, had performed the biggest alchemy taboo there was; human transmutation.

There was just one problem with the gift that had fallen into his grasp. Homunculi were known to be powerful creatures, practically invincible. So then why was this one wasting away right before his eyes? He couldn't figure it out. He'd have to do more research on the subject to try and fill in the blanks, and he'd have to do it quickly. If healing spells weren't working on the boy, then Voldemort was sure that he didn't have too much time left.

'_But how had he survived in Azkaban like this?_' Voldemort wondered to himself. '_He had been in there for several months._'

That's when his eyes caught another interesting bit of information in the boy's file. It was only listed as a theory by Ministry officials; they had no solid proof to back it up, but it was suggested that the boy was cursed in some way or casting a curse himself. Apparently the other prisoners in the cells surrounding the boy deteriorated in health much more quickly than was normal. Many of the prisoners complained of lethargy and weakness, and for a while their complaints were ignored because weakness was to be expected in Azkaban of all places. However, when the prisoners started dieing, prisoners that could still be considered young and therefore able to withstand the effects of Azkaban, an investigation was carried out on the matter. Only one thing had been discovered in the investigation and that was that the prisoners that had been complaining of weakness had been unable to perform even the simplest of spells. They had the magical capacity of a squib, and with no magic on their side, they were much more vulnerable to the effects of dementors which would explain some of the prisoners early demise. Of course, their magic eventually returned once they were moved to a cell further away from the boy.

"I wonder..." Voldemort murmured, setting the file down on the bed.

With a curious glint in his eyes, he laid a pale hand down on the boy's shoulder and waited. Nothing happened. He didn't feel any different than how he usually felt. Narrowing his eyes in concentration, he squeezed the boy's shoulder as he forced a small amount of raw magic to trickle into the blond's body. It wasn't a trick most wizard's knew how to do as you had to have complete control over the magic in your own body. Still, nothing seemed to happen, and just as Voldemort was beginning to wonder if he was wrong in his own theory or maybe the so-called 'curse' only happened gradually over time, he felt it. It was sudden, the feeling as if some _thing_ had lashed out and latched onto his magic, consuming it greedily like a starving animal that had only just noticed that there was food nearby.

Voldemort quickly pulled his hand away and the feeling soon dissipated. Flexing his hand by his side, he noticed that the boy seemed to be breathing a bit easier than before.

'_He's feeding off of our magical energy,_' Voldemort realized. '_And he's dieing because he's not getting enough._'

With this realization, Voldemort frowned, because there was something he was forgetting, something important about the creature before him. Grabbing the file off the bed, Voldemort turned on his heel and left the room. On his way down the hall to the apparition point, he met up with Lucius and hissed out a few quick orders.

"I'll need you and your wife to keep the boy stable while I'm gone, Lucius. Take turns casting spells on him frequently throughout each day until I return, but nothing dangerous. We wouldn't want to risk damaging him if one of those spells happened to work, now would we?" Voldemort said. "Do you understand?"

"Yes, my Lord," Lucius said.

"Contact me if there are any changes with his health," Voldemort said before leaving Lucius in the hall as he continued on to the apparition point.

He had some research to do.

.

* * *

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Draco Malfoy stood crouched before the door of an empty guest room that, over time, had become more of a storage place for things that his family no longer wanted, but had no desire to give up. Knickknacks, old quidditch supplies and other things of the sort were stacked up on shelves and on top of dressers. The door that he was currently hiding behind lead out into the main hall and was only open just enough for him to peer through with one eye. In his line of sight was another door that belonged to the guest room that had become the source of much curiosity and frustration for him over the past few days.

He hadn't been home for the summer for very long before his father was rushing out of the Manor every couple of nights to go on raids or special missions for the Dark Lord. During the last raid though, something had changed; something that kept both of his parents on edge and something that kept his father home a lot more (not that Draco was complaining. He may not have the best father/son relationship with his dad, but it was still nice to have him home more often even if 'family time' meant awkward silences and stiff conversations).

They wouldn't talk about it no matter how many times he brought it up, so he didn't know too much about the subject. Draco did know two things for sure though, and that was that the raid happened at Azkaban (if the Daily Prophet and his Aunt Bella's sudden reappearance were anything to go by) and there was something in the guest room that had to do with whatever it was that the Dark Lord currently had his parents involved in. He knew this because he would see his parents emerging from the guest room multiple times throughout the day.

He also knew this because they both forbid him from entering the room. _Him!_ Draco Malfoy! Forbidden from entering a room in his _own house._ The mere notion of it was ridiculous. His mother said that she didn't want him getting involved; his father said that there was nothing of interest in the room for him. Well, _he_ would be the judge of what did and did not interest him, thank you very much. He did not spend a year at school obeying their rules (_to an extent_) just to come home for the summer and have more rules to follow.

Which was why he was currently hiding one room down from the mysterious guest room, waiting impatiently for his mother to leave for lunch. He'd have just enough time to sneak in after she left and check out whatever it was that was in the room before he'd be expected to join them down in the dining room for lunch. After what felt like an unbearably long wait, his mother finally left the room, closing the door behind her. Draco waited until he could no longer hear her footsteps before he made his move.

Creeping out of his hiding place, he snuck the short distance down the hall to the guest room, constantly looking around himself and keeping his ears open to make sure that there was no one coming. He reached the door to the guest room without incident and opened it just enough to peak inside and make sure that there were no house elves that might tell his parents. Seeing that the room was clear, he slipped inside and closed the door behind him with a quiet click.

Standing at the threshold of the room, his eyes scanned his surroundings for anything out of the ordinary. Something like battle plans, or a caldron filled with a new, special potion, or a dark magical object of some sort. However, to his great shock and disappointment, there was nothing. The room looked like any other guest room in the Manor.

"That was anti-climatic," Draco murmured to himself with a frown.

It didn't make sense. There had to be _something_ worth while in the room. Why else would his parents be spending so much time in the room as well as put up an effort to keep him out?

That's when he heard the breathing. It was so faint that he almost didn't catch it, and for a second he thought that he had been caught, that someone had entered the room without him realizing it. A quick glance around not only proved otherwise, but he also spotted a lump among the bed sheets. Raising an intrigued eyebrow, he slowly walked around to the side of the bed. The person appeared to be sleeping, if the even rise and fall of the bed sheets was anything to go by, and so Draco moved as quietly as he could. He wasn't about to go waking up someone who could be directly connected to the job the Dark Lord had given his parents that was making them so stressed.

As he reached the side of the bed, he was shocked and disappointed once again, for laying in the bed was... a boy. Just a boy with long blonde hair who looked to be around Draco's age, though he couldn't be quite sure. Draco didn't really know what he had been expecting; maybe some old, grizzly looking wizard or even someone a bit more like his Aunt Bella, but he definitely hadn't been expecting some plain-looking kid.

'_Well, maybe plain isn't exactly the right word,_' Draco thought to himself as he knelt down to get a closer look at the red markings on the boy's hand that wove around his wrist and disappeared up under the long sleeves of the robes he wore. '_One of my old robes,_' Draco noted as he lightly prodded the red mark, his eyes darting up to the boy's face to check for any reaction. The boy seemed unaffected and continued to sleep.

Most magical tattoos moved and Draco wondered for a moment if the one the boy had was muggle made. Sighing, he pulled his hand away and stood up straight.

"Father was right," he muttered quietly to himself. "Nothing of interest for me in here. How boring."

Draco turned to leave, but just as he did, an iron grip suddenly latched onto his wrist. Though he would never admit it, his heart leaped into his throat, and he cursed himself for not having his wand on hand. He attempted to school his startled expression into something more composed as he turned to face the boy whose grip only tightened around his wrist.

'_What?_' he was about to ask, but then froze when he finally locked eyes with the boy. Twin golden orbs stared back at him like a werewolf's or some other dark creature he's read about in the past. The boy only continued to stare though, and once Draco got over the shock of the blond's eye color, he noticed just how glazed over and unfocused those eyes were. He wondered for a moment if the blonde even noticed that he was standing there. Before he could wonder further though, golden eyes slid shut and the boy's hand fell limply back onto the bed.

'_Weird,_' Draco thought, taking a step back from the bed. '_Too weird for my tastes._'

As Draco fled from the room, he decided that he didn't care who the boy was and what his connection was with the Dark Lord; and he didn't care to know just what his parents had been doing these past couple of days and how the boy was involved. This was one matter that he would leave well enough alone. When he entered the dining room several minutes later, he greeted his parents as if nothing out of the ordinary had happened.

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* * *

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"Red stones," Voldemort realized. "Of course."

Thanks to some old alchemy tomes he had obtained back in his youth when he had been interested in the subject, he had been able to do a bit more in-depth research on homunculi and refresh his memory on a subject he hadn't read about for many years. The very important fact that he had been forgetting about his latest asset is that homunculi are incomplete when they are first created and need to consume a good amount of red stones to gain strength and assume their final form. Now, if the description in the book was anything to go by, then the homunculus that he found was, appearance-wise, perfectly complete. However, even though he _looked_ complete, his deteriorating health spoke otherwise.

There was just one problem with this realization and that was that Voldemort had no way of obtaining any red stones. As for making some, he couldn't perform alchemy himself and the process of making red stones took much more time than he had. Fortunately, based on the Ministry's report and what he had found out earlier at the Malfoy Manor, the boy could get the energy he needed in other ways than through red stones. So, keeping in mind the fact that red stones grew more powerful when infused with human souls, Voldemort came up with an alternative solution for his problem.

Deep within one of the wizarding world's most darkest forests was a carnivorous plant that fed off of human souls, much like a dementor's kiss. It was an extremely hardy plant that not only survived through the Ministry's many attempts at destroying it, but it also lived off of only one soul every couple of years due to the muggle repelling charms put in place by the Ministry. If Voldemort were to provide the plant with a more regulated diet, he was sure that it would supply him with the perfect potion ingredient for an energy and power boosting potion, and he had just the potions master in mind to make it.

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_End of chapter three! Hopefully you're all still liking it. I dont really know how accurate the red stone thing is because theres really not a lot of information out there about it and a lot of that information is vague an unhelpful, so I just wrote what sounded right to me._

_I'll update when I can. Review please and tell me what you think!_


	4. Chapter 4

_Hello all! First, I'd like to thank everyone for their wonderful reviews! You guys rock! Also, I'm currently working on a primitive library computer, so any formatting errors that may show up in this fic can be blamed on that (I should be good though). Here's chapter four!_

_"_**Amestrian**_"_

_"_English"

"_Xinginese" (did I spell that right?)_

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or Fullmetal Alchemist, nor am I making any profit off of this story, so please don't sue!

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**Chapter Four**

'The Red Thorned Soul Stealer', 'The Devil's Sacrifice,' 'Hell's Guardian.' It was a dark plant with many different ridiculous names that could never quite describe the horrors that would befall you if you happened to stumble upon it. Severus Snape was an expert Potions Master, one of the best, and he had brewed many different types of strange potions throughout his career as a potions maker, but the most recent one the Dark Lord had him create really took the cake in the strange department.

A re-energizing and power boosting potion that would allow the drinker to safely consume the energy the carnivorous Soul Stealer gained from the human souls it fed off of. Normally, Severus could easily assume that the Dark Lord wanted such a potion for himself, but he didn't think that was the case this time. In the past, whenever the Dark Lord wanted Severus to brew a potion specifically for him, he would say so. The Dark Lord had no reason to lie about such a thing now, as Severus had never given him a reason to mistrust him. Also, it was generally safer for the drinker and easier for a Potions Master to brew such a specific and customized potion when they knew who that potion was for; so no, Severus did not think that the potion was for the Dark Lord's own consumption, but for someone else. The Dark Lord had been tight-lipped as to who, and Severus wasn't about to question him on it.

He of course alerted Dumbledore of the strange potion request and would keep his eyes and ears open for any information about the drinker, but he personally felt no need to meet such a person, or even creature, that was so dark that it required a potion that would, essentially, allow it to eat human souls. It took a few failed attempts before he brewed the potion correctly. At least, he hoped he brewed it correctly. He was one of the best in his field, but you could never be sure when making a new potion.

The final result was a thick, almost gel-like liquid that was poison green in color with little glowing flecks of red. He bottled several vials of the substance before delivering them to the Dark Lord; hoping against hope that this would not end poorly in his favor.

* * *

Lord Voldemort watched as Narcissa fed the homunculus a second dose of the as-of-yet nameless soul stealer potion. When he first came by with the potion, he had alerted Narcissa of the fact that it was a new, experimental potion and that she was to keep an eye out for any side effects it may have on the boy. The blond had had no reaction to the first dose, but as Voldemort watched Narcissa force a second dose of the red and green potion down the boy's throat, he could see the boy tense up on the bed, weakly trying to turn his head away from the small glass vile and the potion it contained.

A smile spread across his lips.

"It should only be a matter of time," he hissed.

* * *

_**"Stay here, Al. Don't come out for anything."**_

**_"But what about you?"_**

**_"I'll be fine."_**

_Cold winter air._

**_"Fullmetal!"_**

**_"Stay back!"_**

_Shattered metal and steel._

_Cold. So cold._

_Burning heat._

**_"Colonel!"_**

_Ice._

**_"Roy!"_**

**_"I'll be fine."_**

**_"I'll be fine."_**

**_"I'll be fine."_**

**_"I promise."_**

Edward was torn from his nightmares as the dark embrace of sleep fled from him quickly, but his eyes didn't snap open, and he didn't bolt upright in bed. He simply flinched at the sudden feeling of fabric against what was once his automail arm and leg. His heart thundered in his chest both from the nightmarish memories and his new flesh arm and leg that he had yet to get used to, not that he had much of a chance to process _anything_ what with grim reapers from hell feasting on his happiness and sanity.

As the thought of the grim reapers passed his mind, his body tensed, because any minute they would glide past his cell door, and any minute their mental torture would begin again, playing memory after horrific memory.

But nothing happened.

As the minutes passed with nothing happening and Edward was given more time to actually think things through, he realized that his mind had never been _this_ calm since entering the extension of Hell that was that prison. Even when higher authority figures came to visit for whatever reason, the effects of the grim reapers never completely went away, only diminished to a manageable level. Yet, here, wherever here was, the feeling he got from the grim reapers was completely gone. He had gotten out, somehow, and ended up somewhere else. Somewhere a thousand times better. The soft blankets covering him and the mattress he laid on further confirmed his conclusion, as he had never been allowed such luxuries before.

So he lay there, his body slowly relaxing, and he kept his eyes closed for fear that if he opened them, he'd find that this was all just a wonderful illusion and that he had never really escaped, that the grim reapers were waiting just outside his cell door, waiting for him to get up. Pushing that condemning thought to the back of his mind, Edward instead focused on the feeling of soft fabric against his once-automail arm and leg; fabric from clean clothes that were different from the ones he wore in Hell, and the fabric of the bed sheets and the blankets.

He bunched his right hand up in the fabric before pulling his right arm under the blankets covering him, letting the long sleeve slide up his arm, exposing his skin to the bed sheets. He slowly slid his arm back and forth against the bed sheets, reveling in the feel of fabric against flesh and letting it ground him. He focused on that feeling and only that feeling because everything else was just too much to think about; too much to consider, like trying to remember how he escaped, trying to forget all the bad memories that were still fresh in his mind, trying to figure out just how he came to be, how he went from non-existence to existence, who the people in the robes were, where he was exactly, if that transmutation circle he saw when he first 'woke up' _was_ for human transmutation, and if it was, what did that mean for him?

And red. He kept seeing red, in the literal sense, everywhere he went. Edward knew the red was important, and for some reason, he didn't like the red, but he couldn't wrap his mind around what that meant and just why it felt as if ice was forming in his stomach every time he thought about the red that seemed to be following him everywhere.

Too much. Too much. Too much. Too much to focus on, too much for his jittery mind to process.

Too much energy. What was wrong with him? He felt as if he was in the middle of a battle, where adrenaline was key, or as if he had downed a hundred cups of coffee with nine spoonfuls of sugar per cup.

How many spoonfuls of sugar was that?

Edward stroked his arm back and forth against the sheets a bit more frantically than before, his fingers twitching occasionally. Even though his skin began to crawl, his body feeling ready for... _something_, he continued to lay there, refusing to get up or open his eyes because his current position was safe. By just laying there, nothing bad had happened, no bad memories came flooding forward, and no strange people in robes came to take him away. He felt that if he were to get up, that safe feeling would change. Whether it was a good change or a bad change was a risk he wasn't willing to take.

Nine-hundred spoonfuls of sugar. Was that even possible. Could the human body consume that much sugar without any adverse effects?

Before he could contemplate that further, he heard the sound of a door opening. His right arm stilled under the sheets even though his fingers continued to twitch. He was practically holding his breath as he waited to see what would happen.

Suddenly, a female voice questioned in that same language that the bad people who locked him away spoke, "Are you awake?"

With those few, meaningless words, Edward's decision to not move from the bed was taken from him because he couldn't stay there any longer, not with a potential enemy so close. His eyes snapped open as he shot up in the bed, earning a startled gasp from the woman. He only spared her a quick glance, taking in the sight of her robes which were much fancier than the other people's robes, but still robes non-the-less, before he rolled out of the bed and bolted past her. His body protested the sudden movement, his muscles feeling strained and out-of-use, but he forced himself to keep moving, and-

What the hell was he wearing? Was he- _robes?_ They dressed him in their weird robes? Well, he supposed it was a good way to blend in, but still-

No, he had to focus. If he had any hope of escaping, he had to _focus!_

Edward didn't bother closing the bedroom door behind him as he raced out. Instead, he clapped his hands and swept his palm against one of the hallway walls as he ran, causing a new wall to rise up from the floor behind him, preventing the woman from pursuing him. He stumbled and nearly fell as the alchemy went into effect, for as the wall rose up behind him, that twitchy, skin-tingling feeling faded a bit and he felt so much better because of it. Regaining his footing, Edward continued down the hall, looking for a way out or at least an answer as to where he was and what was going on.

Bedroom, bedroom, closet, storage, bedroom, and not a single window in sight. He twisted and turned down several different hallways, but the place was a freakin' maze and he _still_ had yet to see a single window. To make things worse, that twitchy, tingling feeling was coming back.

'_** Well, alchemy helped it go away before. Maybe alchemy will help it go away again,**_' he thought to himself as he raised his hands to clap. '_**While I'm at it, I might as well blast my way through a couple walls to see if I can-**_'

What in the world was on his hands?

_Slam!_

Had Edward been paying attention to where he was going, he might have noticed the teenaged boy turning the corner at the same time as him. However, that was not the case and he ended colliding with the poor boy at full speed, sending both of them tumbling to the ground. Hitting the ground hard, Edward's mind became so twisted up between deciding if he should get back up and continue running, checking to see if the other boy was alright, checking to see if the other boy was a threat, looking at his hands to see just what the hell was on them, and using alchemy to make the tingling go away, that he nearly hyperventilated in his panic.

'_**Alchemy, alchemy, alchemy!**_' his mind screamed, begging him to make the twitchy, tingling, fire-ants-under-the-skin feeling go away.

Edward raised his hands to clap, ignoring everything else around him, and was therefore understandably surprised when a hand grabbed his wrist. He twisted around in place, his free hand curling up into a fist, and he almost punched the other boy before his eyes processed what he was seeing.

He saw short, blond hair. However, in his eyes he didn't see platinum blond, but a darker, dirty blond; and instead of silver eyes, he saw that indescribable light brown that could only belong to-

"**Al?**" Edward asked quietly.

He received only a blank look, but no, he was sure that it was Alphonse. It _had_ to be. Being lost and alone in this strange place with these strange people was too unbearable to even consider. Luckily, Edward wouldn't have to worry about that now that he had his little brother back and he would do everything in his power to keep Al safe from whatever harm the robed people may want to cause him. He had already broken his promise once and left Alphonse alone, he wasn't about to do it again.

"**Alphonse,**" Edward croaked before springing forward to wrap his little brother up in a hug. Ignoring the way his brother tensed against him, he babbled, "**I'm so glad that you're okay and that they didn't get you. I'm sorry. I'm so sorry that I... well, that doesn't matter now does it? We're both here.**" Pulling away from Al, but still holding him at arm's length, he asked, "**But... where is here? Do you know? How did we get here?**"

Alphonse stared at him for a long moment, looking thoroughly confused, before he finally opened his mouth and said, "What are you-"

"Silence, boy," a voice hissed from behind them.

Startled, Edward whipped around to face the voice before clapping his hands and slamming them against the marble floor. The blue electricity of alchemy crackled around him and it felt so very good to burn up some of that wild extra energy that bubbled up inside and made his skin crawl. Staggering to his feet, Edward snatched up the newly made spear that had risen out of the ground and stepped in front of Al, ready to defend his brother against this new threat.

Standing before him, dressed in dark robes, was a reptilian-looking man and Edward's stance faltered for a moment as he remembered the chimera he had met in Hell, the one that he had asked for help. It would seem that he made the right choice in trusting the man then, as he was free from that torturous place, but at that time he had had nothing to lose. There was nothing the chimera could have done to him then that would have been worse than what Hell was dishing out. Now, however... now he had Al to protect, and although the chimera had given him no reason to mistrust him, Edward wasn't about to let his guard down and risk Al's safety. The spear remained tightly within his grasp, ready to attack or defend.

"An alchemist? Or is that just your special power? It _does_ look very much like alchemy," the chimera murmured. "Just without the arrays."

There was a long pause as the chimera seemed to be thinking about something, before he pulled a stick out of one of his sleeves, the same type of stick that the woman who attacked him had. Behind him, Edward could hear Al smother a quiet, but fearful gasp. Tightening his grip on the spear, Edward glared at the man and growled, "**Careful, now. You may have helped me before, but I don't have any issues fighting you if I have to.**"

"That's quite an unusual language you're speaking," the chimera hissed. "Not one I've ever heard before, and I'm well-versed in many languages, so I at least know what you _aren't_ speaking. Let's assume for a minute that you are an alchemist. The odds are more likely that you were from an alchemy-driven country. Xing, perhaps?"

The chimera pointed the stick at himself and a beam of light shot out of it and into him. Edward tensed, waiting to see just what sort of alchemy the man had cast on himself. Nothing happened though.

"_Can you understand me now?_" the chimera asked.

Edward's eyes widened and the spear lowered just an inch, because suddenly the chimera was speaking Xinginese, a language that he actually recognized. Edward didn't really speak the language himself, but with Xing being a neighbor to his country, he had picked up a little bit during his search for the philosophers stone.

"_No speak... good Xing,_" Edward said slowly, frowning in frustration.

The chimera's eyes lit up.

"_But you understand it a little,_" the chimera said, then continued more slowly. "_What do you speak?_"

Recognizing the word '_speak_' and the fact that it had been used in a question, Edward took a leap of faith and said, "_Amestris. Speak Amestrian._"

The chimera smiled and again pointed the stick at himself and used that strange alchemy that didn't make any sort of sense. After all, how could alchemy allow you to speak different languages? Edward wasn't about to look a gift horse in the mouth now, but if he got the chance in the future, he'd like to do some research on the strange stick alchemy he kept seeing people use.

"**Can you understand me now?**" the chimera questioned, and Edward nearly dropped his spear in surprise.

"**I- yes. Yes, I can understand you,**" Edward said, hardly believing his ears, and just like with Al, the need to know, to understand everything that was going on, took precedence over all else. "**Where are we? Why is everyone wearing robes? What sort of alchemy did you use just now and how are you using it through that stick? Just what was that place you found me in?**"

"**Calm yourself. All your questions will be answered in due time**," the chimera said, holding up a hand as if to hold back the questions, or perhaps to try and soothe a frightened animal, and Edward nearly giggled at the thought that between him and a chimera, _he_ was the more animalistic one. Although Edward supposed that there was some truth to this thought, for as the chimera took a step forward, non-threatening though it may have been, Edward was sure that if he had been a dog, his hackles would have risen.

"**Woah, no one said you could come any closer,**" Edward said, reaching behind himself with one hand to pull Al to his feet. Forcing his brother back a few steps, he growled, "**We're not friends now just because you speak my language. I still don't know who you are and I want my questions answered now, not later.**"

"**The hallway is no place for this discussion,**" the chimera said calmly, but there was a dangerous glint in his eyes. "**Come with me and I'll gladly explain things. Of course, you'll have to let go of your hostage first.**"

"**Hostage?**" Edward murmured, confused, then blinked in surprise. "**Al? Al's not my hostage.**"

"**'Al'?**" the chimera repeated with a frown. "**You know this boy?**"

"**Yes,**" Edward said, "**and he goes anywhere I go.**"

"**This conversation is not meant for his ears. Al will be perfectly safe here. I promise you, you'll meet up with him later,**" the chimera said.

Edward's gaze darted between the chimera and his little brother, unsure of what to do. He had just barely found his brother and he didn't want to leave him behind again, even if it meant getting answers to his questions. The decision was made for him though, as the chimera made a shooing gesture with his hands and Al turned to leave without any hesitation, pulling his wrist from Edward's grasp. He watched as his little brother disappeared down another hallway before reluctantly turning back to the chimera.

"**He better stay safe,**" Edward said quietly, leaving the threat hanging.

"**As I said before, he'll be fine,**" the chimera said.

"**All right, lead the way.**"

* * *

From within his own personal chambers in Malfoy Manor, Voldemort watched as the blond paced back and forth like a caged tiger, twirling the marble spear in one hand as if it weighed nothing. If he wanted this situation to work in his favor, with the homunculus before him being on his side, he'd have to pick his words carefully. The only problem was finding a starting point.

"**Would you put that spear away?**" he hissed irritably. "**I'm your ally, not your enemy.**"

"**I don't know that for sure,**" the blond said as he stopped his pacing and turned to stare at the serpentine man. The twirling of the spear stopped as the boy instead tossed it from hand to hand. Golden eyes darted back and forth, taking in everything that was in the room as if judging whether or not it was a possibly threat, and his body was tense, clearly ready for any sort of attack. "**Besides, it'd be so much easier to stab you in the throat if I kept it.**"

He stated it so matter-of-factly.

Sighing as if the boy keeping the spear was merely an inconvenience to him, Voldemort said, "**Tell me a little bit about yourself. Your name for starters.**"

"**Edward Elric,**" the blond said after a moment's pause, the marble spear being tossed back and forth, back and forth. The golden eyes stopped and fixed Voldemort with a calculating stare."**I thought I was the one getting answers here.**"

"**You are,**" Voldemort said while rolling the boy's name around in his head. Edward Elric. It sounded vaguely familiar, but Voldemort had heard many names throughout his life, it'd be impossible to pinpoint where he heard this one. "**but I need to know what you already know before I can explain anything. You're from Amestris, correct?**"

"**Yes.**"

"**What date is it?**" Voldemort asked curiously.

Edward paused and began to twirl the spear again.

"**Well... I don't know _now_.**" he said, uncertain.

"**What was the date _then?_**" Voldemort reiterated.

"**I'm not sure of the month or day, I can't really remember that. There was snow where I was, but I was pretty close to the border when...**" he trailed off with a frown, before shaking his head. "**It was 1791. Why?**"

1791. That fateful date when alchemy and all alchemists were wiped off the face of the planet. Or at least, that's what the muggles believed. Nicholas Flamel and his final creation, the homunculus standing before him, was proof enough that alchemy didn't completely die.

"**Edward, are you an alchemist?**" Voldemort finally asked, eyeing the spear twirling in the boy's hand, the spear he had effortlessly pulled out of the floor.

The twirling immediately stopped and the end of the spear's handle slammed against the floor. It was easy to tell from the boy's stance and the look in his eyes that he felt threatened, and it was that reaction alone that answered one of Voldemort's biggest questions; a question that he wouldn't have been sure how to ask without opening up a can of worms. Edward hadn't been at all confused or startled when he pulled that spear out of the marble floor; it was clear that he knew what he was doing, and the reason he felt threatened now was because he had been alive during the massacre of alchemy, a barbaric time where anyone who was accused of being an alchemist would be killed. The boy clearly didn't know that such a time had long passed.

A smile spread across Edward's face and he laughed for a second before he seemed to regain control of himself. A frown replaced the smile as he said, "**Y-yeah... I'm... I'm an alchemist, but so are you. I saw you. You used that stick as some sort of conductor or something.**"

"**Yes**," Voldemort said as he pulled out his wand and pretended to examine it. "**You're right. I'm an alchemist too, but my way of alchemy is a bit more complicated than that.**" His red eyes traveled from his wand back up to Edward as he continued, "**There is much to explain, Edward. I suppose I should start by saying that the current year is 1995. Over two-hundred years have passed since you were last alive and a lot has changed since then.**"

The marble spear clattered to the ground, but Edward didn't seem to notice.

"**Two-hundred years,**" Edward choked. "**I... why should I believe you?**"

Pointing his wand against one of the room's walls, Voldemort conjured a mirror. As he approached the mirror, he called over his shoulder, "**Come here, Edward. There's something you should see.**"

Voldemort watched through the mirror as Edward shifted from foot to foot, staring at him uncertainly, before he finally joined Voldemort next to the mirror. His fingers were curled into claws at his side, twitching occasionally, and his golden eyes darted back and forth between Voldemort and the mirror.

"**Lift up your right sleeve and tell me what you see,**" Voldemort said.

Edward frowned in confusion, but lifted up his right sleeve anyway. He gasped at the sight of the red markings and tugged his sleeve up even further, stretching his arm out and twisting it in different directions to try and see every angle in the mirror. He checked his left arm to see that it too had the markings before he dropped to the floor to check his legs. It seemed that the red markings covered every limb and as Edward pulled down the collar to his robe and shirt, he could see that the markings had even clawed their way up onto his neck.

"**It... it looks like pieces to an array,**" Edward finally said, his voice shaking, as he rose to his feet. "**But what does that mean? The pieces are too scattered to see what they do. I'd have to see more of it, and try and reassemble it to even get a general idea.**"

"**It wouldn't surprise me if you didn't know too much on this subject,**" Voldemort said. "**There is, however, one particular marking on your left shoulder that should answer your question. If it doesn't, I'll try to explain.**"

Pulling up the sleeve on his left arm, Edward slowly angled his shoulder toward the mirror before taking a horrified step back.

"**The ouroboros,**" he whispered in disbelief, before muttering to himself, "**That array from before... looked almost like... but it couldn't have... And yet...**"

"**You know of the ouroboros?**" Voldemort asked, keeping his voice calm and even, being careful not to further upset a clearly distraught homunculus.

"**Yes,**" Edward said shakily as his grip on his sleeve tightened. "**Someone tried to bring me back, right? I had been dead for _two-hundred_ years and someone just _had_ to bring me back! ...Or at least, someone tried to bring Edward Elric back and they got me instead, right?... but... but I...**" he turned away from the mirror and stared up at Voldemort, as if he held all the answers. "**I still feel like Edward Elric! I don't feel any different, so how can I be sure that I'm not.. or that I am..**" golden eyes drifted back to the mirror. "**It doesn't make any sense. I've seen homunculi before and none of them had these red markings.**"

Putting aside the fact that Edward not only knew of homunculi, but had seen them before, Voldemort said, "**I'm sorry, but I don't have the answers to those questions. The man who created you died from the process.**"

Frowning, Edward asked quietly, "**What was his name?**"

"**Nicholas Flamel,**" Voldemort said. "**Perhaps, for you, he used a different formula. A different array.**"

Edward let his sleeve fall back over his arm and as his gaze drifted to the floor, he asked, "**What about Al?**"

"**Al?**" Voldemort questioned, remembering how Edward had referred to Draco with that name back in the hall. "**You're blond friend from the hall?**"

"**Alphonse, he's my little brother,**" Edward explained, his golden eyes rising to meet Voldemorts red ones. "**Is he... like me?**"

"**If you mean a homunculus, then no,**" Voldemort said, thinking quickly. "**We're not sure how Alphonse came to arrive at this time, not even Al himself knows. However it happened though, the process erased many of his memories.**"

Edward looked pained by this fact, and was quiet for several minutes before finally saying, "**I guess it's better that way. There were a lot of horrible things that would be good to forget... Does he even remember me? He was acting strangely in the hall.**"

"**Alphonse doesn't talk much about his past, but I'm sure that he remembers you. What he doesn't remember, you'll just have to remind him,**" Voldemort said.

Edward nodded before he began pacing around the room again. His fingers twitched at his sides and he looked antsy. He stopped in front of the room's oak desk, one that Voldemort spent frequent hours at going over plans for the war. He ran one hand over the desk's surface before clapping and pressing his hands against the top of the desk. The blue electricity of alchemy crackled around his hands as a small wooden horse rose up out of the desk's surface, leaving behind a small indentation. He seemed to sigh in relief before he picked up the wooden animal and fiddled with it.

Looking up from his tiny alchemy creation, Edward murmured, "**Two-hundred years, huh?**"

"**Like I said, there's a lot to explain,**" Voldemort said.

* * *

There _was_ a lot to explain. A little over two-hundred years worth of information, to be exact, and so the chimera took a seat in a large, rather powerful looking chair that Edward was sure was supposed to make anyone feel intimidated by the speaker sitting in it. However, not only was he Edward Elric, the Fullmetal Alchemist (not some reject copy, no, no, no. Until he gained solid proof, he refused to believe he was anyone else but Edward Elric), he was also a homunculus of some sort (a different breed of homunculi because the red, red, so much red was so different from all of the other homunculi he had met in the past), so what the hell did he have to fear from this chimera?

Said chimera started where Edward left off, after his death. Apparently what happened to him in 1791 (what happened to the Colonel - _"**Roy!**"_ - what could have happened to Alphonse) was not an isolated incident. All around the world, alchemists had been killed and information on alchemy had been destroyed. For their own safety, the remaining alchemists had gone into hiding and formed their own society. Shortly after the supposed fall of alchemy, Amestris, Xing, and so many other countries Edward knew of had been broken up and renamed. Languages changed with them and knowledge of the countries faded away as time passed until only those who studied the history books knew of how things had been.

As the decades passed, alchemy also gained a new form in which sticks ("**We like to call them wands.**") were used as a catalyst of sorts to channel the alchemy through. The different arrays were given specific names and by calling out these names, one could activate the array. To further hide themselves from the muggles ("**Non-alchemists**"), many alchemists stopped calling it alchemy and instead referred to it as 'magic' and themselves 'witches and wizards'.

"**That's the dumbest thing I ever heard of,**" Edward said, referring to the 'witches and wizards' part.

"**Just because someone's smart enough to know alchemy, doesn't mean they're not a moron,**" the chimera sighed.

"**Good point,**" Edward muttered.

The chimera went on to explain a little bit of general history behind the new age of alchemists. He explained Hogwarts, a hidden school where the children of alchemists were sent to learn how to wield their wands. Apparently there were hidden villages where only alchemists resided, and the people in charge of the alchemists in this region of the world was referred to as the 'Ministry of Magic; a corrupt organization that was responsible for locking Edward up and leaving him to be tortured by grim reapers. Hell had a name, and its name was Azkaban.

"**It's a prison for alchemists,**" the chimera explained. "**And those grim reaper creatures you're referring to are called dementors. They feed off of happiness.**"

"**Why was I sent there?**" Edward asked quietly. "**That woman attacked me first. I was just trying to defend myself. I get that they couldn't understand me, but... it's like they weren't even trying to hear my side of the story.**"

"**These are dark times we live in,**" the chimera said solemnly. "**Even if the Ministry did find a way to understand you, I have a feeling that they still would have locked you up. You see, the Ministry fears what they don't understand. They would have surely locked you up had they realized you were a homunculus, but when they made their decision, they didn't even know _that_ much about you. The only thing they were sure of was that you weren't completely human, and for them that was reason enough to lock you up.**"

"**That's hardly fair,**" Edward said sullenly.

"**Dark times,**" the chimera repeated. "**Edward, there's another reason why I broke you out of Azkaban, other than the fact that it was the right thing to do. You see, the other alchemists and I are at war. I suppose you could say that there are three sides, although two of those sides want the same thing, they just have different ways of achieving their goal. There's the Ministry of Magic, led by a man named Cornelius Fudge, and there's the Order of the Phoenix, led by a man named Albus Dumbledore. Both the Ministry of Magic and the Order of the Phoenix wish for things to remain as they are, with alchemists being forced to remain in hiding and us 'partial humans,' as they would call it, having little to no rights. As I'm sure you noticed, I'm not exactly what one would call a picture of normal.**"

"**You're a chimera of some sort of reptile,**" Edward said. "**A snake would be my guess.**"

"**In a way, yes,**" the chimera agreed. "**Though the procedure was a bit more complicated than that. Either way, it was an accident that led me to be like this, and the Order and the Ministry are using it to their advantage, painting me out to be some sort of monster since I look the part.**"

"**What's you're role in this war?**" Edward asked, wanting to get to the point of this whole conversation.

"**I lead the third side in this war,**" the chimera explained. "**Unlike the Order and the Ministry who fear change, I wish to free alchemists and 'partial humans' from persecution. I, and others on my side, am tired of hiding. It has been over two-hundred years and I think it's about time to rejoin the world. It is just as much our right to be walking freely out there in the world as it is the non-alchemists. With your help, I believe we may just be able to achieve this goal**."

"**I don't even know your name and you're asking me to join your war?**" Edward said with a raised eyebrow.

"**My name, of course. Where are my manners?**" The chimera hissed. "**Most know me as... I'm not sure how to say it in your language.** Lord Voldemort."

"Loord... Vul-da-muert," Edward said slowly, frowning. It was quite a mouthful and he had a feeling that he would never remember it. He supposed that 'the chimera' would work most of the time, but still. "**You're... a leader, you said? Kind of like...**"

A Colonel? No. There's was only one Colonel. Colonel Bastard. ("**_Roy!_**")

Edward shook his head.

"**A Captain? Major? General?**" Edward asked while at the same time wondering if the chimera understood military ranking.

"**Whatever works for you,**" the chimera said dismissively, not seeming to care.

Edward supposed it didn't matter, whether he called this man Captain or General, since this technically wasn't an actual military. Either way, he'd be following the chimera's orders if he chose to join the man in his quest. Of course, since it wasn't the military, that meant no contracts, no one pulling rank over him, no risk of being court-martialed. He wasn't naive enough to believe that there _wouldn't_ be consequences for not obeying orders, but as far as he was concerned, he could easily grab Al and leave if he needed to.

"**Major V,**" Edward finally decided. He chose Major partially because he saw himself on equal grounds with the chimera, but mostly because a childish part of him didn't want to place the serpentine man above Colonel. "**Even if I do join you in your fight, I still don't understand how I can help. My alchemy sounds primitive in comparison to your new-age alchemy. What use could I be to you?**"

The chimera smiled, "**It's true, our alchemy can do much that yours can't, but it has two fatal flaws. The first is that most of the new age alchemy doesn't seem to have any effect on you, making it very difficult to defend against your attacks. The second is that most alchemists these days _can't_ perform alchemy without their wand. By learning this new way of alchemy, we had to give up the old. Even your brother, who was able to learn our alchemy when he came to this time, can no longer use a transmutation circle the same way you can. By getting rid of the enemy's wands, we ensure an easy victory. The same could be said for the alchemists on my side if they lost their wands. You, however, are a wild card.**"

When he put it like that, the whole wand thing sounded even dumber to Edward than before. Of course, he could see now the benefit he could offer in this war. He had such a huge advantage over these people when they didn't have their wands that it hardly even seemed fair. Then again, when was war ever fair? That Ministry of Magic hadn't been fair to him when they decided to ship him off to Azkaban (_always screaming. Make it stop! Make it stop!_). He shuddered.

He didn't need to think any further on it; He came to his decision.

"**I'll join your cause on one condition,**" Edward said, deadly serious. "**You leave Al out of this war. I don't want him getting involved in any battles, in any secret missions, or even any planning for battles or secret missions. No fighting or anything of the sort. I just want him safe.**"

The chimera smiled and, holding out his hand to seal the deal, he said, "**Done.**"

"**I'll hold you to it,**" Edward said before shaking the man's hand with enough strength to let him know that he could easily break his fingers if he wanted to.

* * *

_That's all for chapter four! (and somewhere in Hogwarts, Albus Dumbledore sensed a disturbance in the force). Hopefully I achieved just the right amount of stable and unstable for Edward in this chapter. It's difficult because I don't want to overdo it with the crazy to the point of it seeming unrealistic, but I also don't want him to appear perfectly fine because he's not. You don't just get out of Azkaban without being a little fucked up._

_As for the current date mentioned in this chapter (2002), I'm not 100 percent sure if that's right, but according to my friend (who's far beyond your usual crazy Harry Potter fanatic), Ginny was born in 1988 and she was 14 by the time the fifth book rolled around (which is where we currently are in this fic, the summer before Harry's fifth year), so math says that the date is 2002 (give or take a few months). (EDIT: I just got a chance to look it up on the Harry Potter Lexicon and the date is actually 1995. Thanks to all you reviewers who helped me out with the dates!)_

_Finally (because it's four in the morning and I can't think of anything else to comment on for this chapter), Voldemort is a lying son-of-a-B._

_Review please and tell me what you think!_


	5. Chapter 5

_Hello everyone! Sorry for the **really** long delay with this chapter. Enjoy!_

Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter or Fullmetal Alchemist, nor am I making any profit off of this story, so please don't sue!

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**Chapter Five**

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Narcissa stared down at the new charm bracelet on her wrist with distaste. Attached to the charms were a series of spells that would allow her to understand as well as speak the same language that their current house guest spoke on top of their knowledge of general English. Both she, her husband, and her son had received one from the Dark Lord. It would have been much easier, in her opinion, to simply give the blond foreigner something similar that would allow him to speak english, but apparently the Dark Lord wanted to limit the number of people that could actually talk to the boy.

The reason the charm bracelet was receiving such ire from her was not because of its appearance, it was actually quite nice looking, it was because of what the bracelet represented. Upon receiving the bracelet from the Dark Lord and learning what it could do, Narcissa knew that she and her family had become deeply involved in whatever plan it was the Dark Lord had in mind for the young, tattooed blond. Despite its fancy appearance, the bracelet was truly a shackle.

They were told that the boy had joined their side of the war, and that for an indefinite amount of time, they were to be the boy's keeper. They were to look after him, keep him fed and relatively happy, and they were to keep a report of anything strange and magical the boy may do. They were also told to play along with any delusions the boy may have; the biggest one being that Draco was actually the boy's younger brother Alphonse, and on top of this all, they were told to keep quiet about the boy's presence in their home. If anyone asked, the boy was a distant cousin they were looking after.

Draco was then pulled aside for a private discussion with the Dark Lord and Narcissa was sent off to tend to their house guest; a guest that was the reason why she had to call Draco 'Alphonse', a guest who was responsible for the fact that her son was currently alone in a room with the Dark Lord. Try as she might, she couldn't keep the frown off her face as she entered what had now become the blond's sleeping quarters. It was the same guest room he had been staying in prior to waking up.

She greeted him stiffly, briefly introducing herself as Narcissa Malfoy, the wife of the house as well as a healer, and that she was here to see to his general health.

The boy frowned at the word 'healer' but otherwise made no comment, and proceeded to introduce himself as "**Edward-**" followed by a staticy hissing noise that covered up whatever else he had been about to say. Narcissa pursed her lips. Apparently the charm bracelet came with some sensors. No matter though, she didn't really care one way or the other what the boy's last name was.

With introductions out of the way, Narcissa got to work with giving Edward a general check-up. Although she couldn't use magic like she normally would, she could still question the boy on his needs now that he was awake and coherent.

'_Coherent to an extent,_' she thought, her frown deepening.

On top of not appearing to be too physically fit (while he did look better than when he was first rescued from Azkaban, he was still too pale and sickly-looking for her liking), it appeared that he wasn't all there mentally either. It wasn't just the restless fidgeting, the overall paranoid demeanor, or the delusions he had about her son. There was also something in his eyes, something similar to what Narcissa had seen in Bella's eyes ever since her sister's sanity started to slip all those years back. If Narcissa were to attempt to describe it, she would say that it was almost like a glimmer in the eyes of someone who couldn't decide if they wanted to laugh hysterically or scream.

As was to be expected, Azkaban only made that glimmer stronger in Bella's eyes, and was probably the cause of it in the boy's. While Narcissa may love her sister dearly, she wouldn't trust Bella to be alone around her son for too long at a time, and the same went for the boy standing before her. It seemed she didn't have much choice about that in this case, so as she examined Edward and made a mental list of all the potions she'd need to get for him, she decided that she would give the boy a talk and let him know where he stands when it comes to her son.

"**So you're Alphonse's older brother**," she murmured once she finished asking him a series of questions about how he felt physically.

"**Yeah**," Edward said, smiling for the first time since Narcissa had met the boy. "**I'm so glad I was able to find him here**."

Frown remaining firmly in place, Narcissa got straight to the point, "**You must understand, Edward, Alphonse has been with my husband and I for quite a while now. We trust and care for him like we would a son. We do not yet know, however, if we can trust you.**"

Smile dropping from his face, Edward said, "**I would never hurt Alphonse, if that's what you're worried about.**"

He said it so seriously, and sounded so sincere that Narcissa almost felt inclined to believe him. She knew better though than to just take someone for their word, especially when that person was connected to the Dark Lord.

"**Let's hope for your sake that you're telling the truth**," she said, leaving the threat hanging in the air. "**Now, arms out. I need to get your measurements for the tailors. Can't have you running around in Alphonse's clothes the whole time you're here.**"

Edward tensed when she pulled out her wand, and when she conjured up some measuring tape, a curiosity lit up in his eyes. He looked very much like he wanted to ask her something, but for some reason held back. It took some prodding before he raised his arms up like she instructed and even then, while she directed the measuring tape with her wand and wrote down his measurements on a piece of conjured parchment, he was still tense. His eyes never left her wand, as if he was expecting some sort of attack. It was the sort of reaction one would expect from a jumpy muggle, not at all from a wizard that was powerful enough to gain the attention of the Dark Lord.

"**If you're going to go to the trouble of getting me some clothes, could I at least get some pants and shirts to wear under these robes?**" he asked, a light blush coloring his cheeks.

"**That's _muggle_ clothing, Edward,**" she said abhorrently.

"**It's functional and modest,**" Edward said in a tone that asked, '_What's wrong with you people?_'

Heaving a sigh, she said coolly, "**I suppose I'll look into it.**" shaking her head, she began muttering, "**You and.. and Alphonse are both alike in that aspect. Children these days getting swept up in the latest 'pants and shirts' craze. I can tell you right now though that it's summer and you'll be very hot wearing all those layers.**"

"**I'm sure I'll survive,**" Edward said, rolling his eyes.

"**Dinner will be ready in an hour or so,**" she said once the measurements were done. "**You'll be kept on a light diet until you're stomach is ready to handle real food. Now, there's a bathroom through that doorway there, why don't you go take a shower before dinner? Cleaning spells can only do so much.**"

He made a face when she mentioned cleaning spells, but nodded and headed toward the bathroom. Pausing in the doorway to the bathroom, he looked back at her and asked, "**When will I get to see Alphonse?**"

"**He'll be up soon,**" she said curtly. "**Go take a shower.**"

He frowned at her before walking into the bathroom and closing the door behind him. Narcissa shook her head and sighed in frustration as soon as he was out of sight. She could already tell that this was going to be a long and difficult assignment from the Dark Lord, and the fact that there was no ending point to it in sight did nothing to alleviate her stress. Hearing the door to the hallway open behind her, Narcissa turned to see her son peeking into the room.

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Draco's mind reeled with information as he made his way up to the guestroom the Dark Lord had left Edward in. His mother had been sent up nearly an hour before to keep an eye on their new house guest, a house guest that was currently his very first mission from the Dark Lord himself. He was both excited and unnerved by the prospect of it all; excited because being assigned an important mission by the Dark Lord at such a young age was an honor (His father was certainly proud. His mother... not so much), and if he was successful at this mission, he would reach high rankings in the Dark Lord's eyes.

As for being unnerved, well, he really didn't know how well he could actually do on this mission. He was supposed to play the part of Edward's little brother, Alphonse, and being an only child, Draco didn't know the first thing about being a brother, let alone a _little_ brother. Thankfully the Dark Lord gave him a bit more information to go on after his parents left the room, so he wasn't walking into this situation completely blind.

Apparently Edward was a bit delusional about how things were, and it wasn't just about the brother thing either. Edward believed that he had been brought back from the dead, having previously been from the late seventeen-hundreds, born in a place called Amestris, and that 'Alphonse' had somehow joined him in the present time too. On top of that, Edward was apparently an alchemist (something that really didn't mean much to Draco). He didn't believe in magic, but in alchemy, and he believed that magic was just an advanced form of alchemy.

The Dark Lord then proceeded to give Draco a crash course in alchemy (comprehension, deconstruction, reconstruction, arrays and transmutation, his mind was still spinning). Luckily, he was not expected to memorize all of this, or know certain other details about Edward's life that only the real Alphonse would actually know, as the Dark Lord had previously explained to Edward that 'Alphonse' had lost many of his memories of the past.

Still, it wouldn't be an easy mission, and there was no ending in sight for when he would no longer have to play the part of Alphonse. There would also be no instant gratification with this mission for him either. He couldn't tell anyone about Edward unless someone specifically asked and he couldn't get out of talking about it; in which case he would tell them, in English (something that he was not allowed to teach Edward), that Edward was his cousin. He had to keep the mission a secret in general, so that meant no bragging to his house mates. Along with that, Edward had expressly forbid 'Alphonse' from becoming involved in the war, so to keep Edward happy and on their side (because that was what this was really all about), Draco would not be attending any Death Eater meetings, or be involved with any Death Eater raids, and he would most definitely _not_ be receiving a dark mark.

Frankly, they were all things that Draco was happy to be living without. He was a little curious as to what exactly went on at Death Eater meetings, since his father never gave him any details about it, but he had a feeling it wasn't all that pleasant considering how his father sometimes came back from one with a grimace of pain on his face. He wasn't at all interested in the raids or the dark mark though. While it may be cool to show off the mark to some of his closest friends, he heard rumors from some of the older Slytherins that getting it was painful, and he also noticed the way his father winced whenever the mark went off. As for the raids, well, he wasn't stupid, he knew that they usually resulted in a lot of violence and death, and while he may be known at school as a bully, he wasn't a killer.

'_I suppose I'm getting a pretty good deal out of this,'_ Draco mused as he approached Edward's new room. '_Even though it is pretty much a babysitting job._' Standing outside the bedroom door, Draco geared himself up for whatever was to come, because as soon as he walked through that door, he'd be Alphonse, Edward's little brother. '_Just play into his delusions and keep him happy. Might not even be that hard. From what I've heard at school, most siblings aren't even that close. Maybe it'll be the same in this case.'_

Turning the doorknob, Draco opened it just enough to peer through into the room. His silver eyes darted around the room, searching for the tattooed blond, and when Draco didn't see him, his eyes fell on his mother. Stepping into the room, he asked, "**Where's Edward?**"

"**Dra- hm..**" his mother caught herself in time before trying again, "**_Alphonse_... Your brother is in the bathroom taking a shower.**"

They both looked over to the bathroom door and waited until the sound of running water met their ears before taking off their respective translator bracelets.

"How did your... _meeting_ go?" his mother asked quietly.

"It went well," he said. "The Dark Lord just told me a few other things I should know about Edward."

He left it at that, his eyes drifting back over to the bathroom door again. He knew that Edward couldn't understand English and that it was safe to say whatever he wanted to say without the bracelet on, but he still felt that it would be stupid to talk about Edward as if he wasn't in the other room. One could never be too careful, after all. Draco trusted the Dark Lord's judgment, but for all he knew, Edward was faking the whole 'foreigner who didn't know English' thing.

"So what's for dinner?"

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Taking in the general layout of the bathroom, Edward quickly located the soap and the bottles of different hair care products. It would be nice to finally get clean after being stuck in Azkaban for so long. He hadn't had a real bath or shower at all since he had been brought back, which meant that the last time he had truly bathed had been back in the late seventeen-hundreds. He shuddered at the thought, for once grateful that he hadn't had a body that whole time. Several months without bathing was one thing, but two hundred years? Granted, during the past several months he had been alive again, the robed alchemists had used that new-age cleaning alchemy on him, but it just wasn't the same as a nice relaxing shower. Still feeling twitchy and on edge, Edward figured a little bit of relaxation would do him good.

Rolling up the sleeves of his robe, he fiddled with the bathtub knobs until he got a stream of water going. Testing the temperature with his right hand, he marveled at the feel of water running through his fingers, still not quite over the fact that he finally had his limbs back. A smile spread across his face as the water reached just the right temperature. He turned a third knob and the shower head sprang to life.

Shaking the water off his hand, Edward tugged at the robe he was wearing, trying to figure out just how the hell he was supposed to get the stupid thing off of him. Suddenly a loud _pop_ noise met his ears as a hideous looking creature appeared out of thin air before him, holding something in its arms.

Edward's eyes widened.

"Clothes and towels for-"

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* * *

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A startled scream rang out in the bathroom quickly followed by the crackling of electricity as a blue glow seeped out from under the bathroom door. Eyes widening, Draco and his mother rushed to the bathroom door, putting on their translator bracelets along the way, and swung it open just as the blue glow faded.

'_I hope he's decent,_' was Draco's first thought before his eyes actually took in the scene before him.

Edward was thankfully clothed and was currently sitting haphazardly in a corner of the bathtub, almost as if he had fallen in, and was staring in horror at-

'_Is that one of the house elves?_' Draco wondered.

It was a bit hard to tell at first as a stream of ice leading from the shower head had completely encased the unlucky creature where it stood. If he squinted hard enough though, he could just barely make out the form of one of the manor's house elves and the fact that clean clothes and towels were partially frozen into the hunk of ice further confirmed any doubts he may have had.

"**What the hell is that thing? Some kind of chimera?**" Edward nearly shrieked. "**It just appeared out of nowhere!**"

'_Chimera?_' Draco wondered, the image of a lion's head with a goat's body and a dragon's tail filling his head. That didn't even come close to describing what a house elf looked like. '_Must be something alchemy related with the same name._'

"**Um, kind of,**" Draco said, going along with the chimera thing. "**We call them house elves. They're... servants, I guess you could say. They help around the house.**"

"**These people created chimeras just to be their servants?**" Edward asked, sounding horrified.

"**No, no,**" Draco said, judging from Edward's tone that that was the wrong idea for him to be getting. "**They've just always kind of... been around.**"

Edward grew quiet at that, and seemed to be contemplating something.

'_When you don't have a good answer yourself, sometimes it's best to let someone come up with their own answer,_' Draco mused.

"**Are you okay, Edward?**" Narcissa asked indifferently, one eyebrow raised.

Stepping around the bathroom's new ice statue, Draco reached down and grabbed Edward's hands, helping him climb out of the bathtub. The tattooed blond stumbled a bit before regaining his footing on the tiled floor, and Draco forced himself to ignore the way Edward almost seemed to cling to his side.

"**Yeah, I'm okay,**" Edward said quietly, still warily eyeing the frozen house elf.

Following Edward's line of sight, Draco sighed and said, "**They're harmless, Edward, I swear.**"

Edward frowned, not looking too sure, "**But.. It just appeared out of thin air. How is that even possible?**"

"**Magic,**" Draco said simply, hoping it would be enough of an explanation.

Edward scowled, "**You mean alchemy.**"

"**Yeah,**" Draco agreed, holding back an exasperated roll of the eyes. "**New-age alchemy.**"

His mother gave him an odd look but said nothing.

"**You'll have to explain to me how some of this 'new-age alchemy' stuff works,**" Edward said, clearly not thinking too highly of the 'new way of alchemy.'

"**Maybe later,**" Draco said dismissively. "**Right now you need to unfreeze that house elf.**"

His mother could have easily unfrozen the house elf with magic, but at the moment, Draco was curious to see just how well Edward's alchemy could deal with the ice he had previously created. He had only really seen it in action once, when Edward was pulling the spear out of the floor, and he was interested to see it in action again. Judging from the look on his mother's face, she was interested in seeing what he could do as well.

"**House elf,**" Edward said, shaking his head. "**You make it sound like a bad fairy tale.**"

Nevertheless, he cautiously approached the house elf and clapped his hands, just as Draco remembered him doing before when he had pulled that spear out of the marble floor. Draco wondered if Edward always needed to clap his hands to perform alchemy. It was a bit of a ridiculous requirement in his opinion.

Pausing just before his hands touched the ice, Edward looked back over his shoulder at Draco and asked skeptically, "**You're sure it's harmless?**"

"**Yes, it's fine,**" Draco said, crossing his arms over his chest. "**Go ahead.**"

Edward's hands connected to the ice and the same blue electricity crackled to life around him. The ice quickly melted away into a puddle of water. The pipes in the wall shudder for a moment before water once again came spraying out of the shower head, and the house elf fell to its knees with a squeak, the towels and clothes landing on the ground around it with a wet slap.

Edward quickly backpedaled away from the house elf, for some reason still looking disturbed by it despite Draco's assurances that it was harmless. His hands were raised in a ready-to-clap position, apparently waiting for the house elf to attack in some way, and as soon as the house elf spotted this, it squeaked in fear and disappeared with a hurried _pop_. Even after it had left, Edward was still tense.

'_That's one new thing I learned about Edward,_' Draco thought to himself. '_He and house elves don't mix. It'd probably be best to keep the two of them separated for as long as possible. I'll also be sure to never apparate around him once I learn how to in the future._'

Pulling out her wand, Narcissa cast a quick drying spell on the towels and clothes, and used another spell to fold them up neatly and place them on the countertop next to the sink. Slipping her wand back into her pocket, she said as she turned to leave, "**I trust you'll get your brother ready in time for dinner, Alphonse?**"

It was said with cool indifference, but beneath it all, Draco could detect a hint of sadness. It appeared that his mother wasn't too happy about the current arrangements with his identity.

"**Yes, Mo- Ma'am,**" he said, catching himself before he said 'mother.' He watched her leave before turning his attention back to Edward. "**You should probably get into the shower before the water gets cold.**" It was just an excuse to get Edward to hurry up, as a series of spells made sure the manor would never run out of hot water, but it did the job of getting Edward moving. "**I'll be in the bedroom if you need anything.**"

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Edward breathed a content sigh as he stepped into the hot stream of water. It wasn't the most relaxing shower he had been hoping for, as he was still tense from the appearance of that house elf thing and was still half expecting _another_ strange chimera to suddenly appear out of nowhere (because apparently they can do that now). He was also worried about Alphonse, who wasn't quite acting like himself. He wondered just how long Alphonse had been living in this strange new future and was concerned that maybe something had happened that was making him act so differently.

'**_Maybe he's acting different because he's lost most of the memories that made him into the person he grew up to be,_**' Edward thought a bit sadly as he grabbed a bar of soap. '**_Well, no matter how he acts, he's still my brother and that's all that matters._**'

Edward frowned down at the red markings stretching over his pale skin as he began to scrub away whatever Azkaban grime the cleaning alchemy had missed. The red lines and symbols spread everywhere, forming bits and pieces of an array that was both similar and different from the human transmutation array he had become so familiar with. Closing his eyes against the sight of them, he moved on to washing his hair, forcing himself to relax and concentrate only on the task of cleaning his hair and the feeling of running water massaging his back. All thoughts of the insanity going on around him faded from his mind, thoughts of chimera, of Al's personality change, of the new age of alchemy, it all just disappeared and for a few precious seconds he was in a blissful, relaxing nothingness similar to the nothingness he had felt during death.

"**Hurry up, Edward, we have to go to dinner soon!**" Alphonse shouted through the bathroom door, and just like that, Edward was dragged back to the world around him.

Rinsing the rest of the soap off, Edward stepped out of the bathtub and grabbed one of the towels from the sink to wrap around his waist. He grimaced as he caught sight of himself in the bathroom mirror which held back nothing about the truth of the condition of his body. Gone were the muscles he had had before his death, and while he had always been a skinny person, he had never looked quite this sickly.

'**_I'll have to start training my body back to the way it was before._**'

Clapping his hands, he quickly dried himself with alchemy and got dressed in the pair of clean boxers and robe that had been left for him. He was tempted to transmute the dirty robe he had been wearing before into a pair of pants, but decided against it. He couldn't understand how such a thing as pants and shirts had gone out of style in the last few centuries. He supposed that he was at least grateful that wearing them was still an option and that Alphonse hadn't been brainwashed by these new-age alchemists' strange fashion sense. Transmuting some of the fabric of the robe into a piece of string, he weaved his long hair into a braid and tied the end of the braid with the string before leaving the bathroom to head down to dinner with his younger brother.

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_End of chapter._

_BLAAACH! Have you ever forced yourself to write something? It's like vomiting hundreds and hundreds of words. So *wipes mouth* hope you enjoyed the chapter along with that pleasant visual I just provided you with._

_The translation spells attached to the bracelets allow the user to consciously switch back and forth between Amestrian and English (with some sensors in place to fit Voldemort's needs). The reason why I didn't have Narcissa's and Draco's thoughts in **bold** (Amestrian) is because I figured since English is the language they're most familiar with, they'll most likely think in English, not Amestrian. If it really bothers or confuses a lot of people though, I'll go back through and put their thoughts in **bold.**  
_

_One other thing: In the books, what the hell do wizards (in this case purebloods) wear under their robes? The world may never know, but I read a lengthy online discussion about it and it was generally agreed upon that muggle-borns, half-bloods, and most wizarding children of the present day would wear normal muggle clothing on under their robes. Adult wizards on the other hand are baffled by the muggle clothing style because that just wasn't how it was done when they were kids, and any example they presently have to go by is generally the muggle clothes their kids are wearing._

_As for most purebloods, they no likey muggles, so they no likey muggle clothing. With Draco though, I find it hard to believe that he wouldn't at least have pants on under his robe, so I'm going with the whole: he's following the trend that every other kid is following at school, and that's that you wear pants and a shirt on under your robe (_at least_ pants. And yes, I did put way too much thought into this).  
_

_Review please and tell me what you think! _


	6. Chapter 6

_Hey everyone! Sorry for the delay with this chapter. For the past four months, college has been kicking my ass and very soon, the summer semester will begin and the ass-kicking will start anew for another four months, but then I graduate. Something that will probably cause me to fall into a joy-coma, but after that, and after I move and after I get a job, I'll most likely be able to update more regularly. So hang in there until then!_

_Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter and I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist. Don't sue me, I'm poor._

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**Chapter Six**

Edward nearly jumped out of his skin when plates, cups and silverware appeared on the dinner table before him. He had a feeling that he'd never get used to the whole disappearing and reappearing aspect of the new-aged alchemy. The dinner table itself seemed unnecessarily large to Edward for just three people (himself, Al and Mrs. Malfoy), but he supposed that in a house as large as this one, the Malfoys probably hosted a lot of dinner parties, or something else of the sort.

Sitting in one of the chairs at the dinner table, Edward fiddled with a fork he had grabbed from the table and absentmindedly stared at the empty plate before him. Trying to ignore the twitchy pins-and-needles feeling that still lingered, he focused on the sound of Al's voice as his younger brother exchanged small talk with Mrs. Malfoy. They were all apparently waiting for someone to arrive before they could eat, though Edward didn't really care either way. At the moment, he was feeling a little bit nauseous and didn't really feel like eating anything. That seemingly never-ending jittery feeling sure as hell wasn't helping his appetite.

'_**Maybe just a little alchemy,**_' he thought, swallowing thickly as his grip tightened on the fork, and before he knew it, he was clapping and forming the silver utensil into the first thing that popped into his mind. He let out a relieved sigh when the jittery feeling faded a bit more as the alchemy took effect.

A tiny suit of armor rested in his palm. It was comfortingly familiar which was odd considering the failure it represented. Suddenly aware of a lack of talking, Edward looked up to see Mrs. Malfoy and Al staring at him curiously.

"**Oh, um,**" Edward began. His fingers curled around the silver figurine, not wanting Al to see it and be reminded of the form he was once trapped in.

'**_Does he even remember that though?_**' Edward wondered.

"**I can change it back,**" Edward said. Clapping again, he turned the fork was back to its original form.

"**Do you always need to clap to... do what you do, Edward?**" Mrs. Malfoy asked.

The question wasn't really surprising. Even back when he was first alive, and most definitely not the only one who could perform alchemy this way, there were many people who were baffled by his 'circle-less alchemy', at least for the first time they saw it.

"**Yeah, it's how I make a transmutation circle,**" Edward said.

"**For your alchemy,**" Alphonse filled in, sounding unsure for some reason.

Edward nodded his head in agreement before clapping his hands and explaining, "**With my hands together like this, I'm forming the circle with my body. Then I just need to think of what array I want to use and-**"

He touched the fork he had previously set back down on the table and with a crackle of blue electricity, he turned it into a silvery flower. With yet another clap, he turned it back into a fork. The jittery feeling was barely noticeable at this point.

"**Interesting,**" Mrs. Malfoy said, a calculating look on her face.

Just as the room descended into silence, Edward felt a sudden... shift. He couldn't quite explain it, couldn't even understand it, but there was just this _feeling_ that something was suddenly there, that it was drawing near. It set his nerves on edge and he almost felt as if something awoke inside him, something that seemed to curiously sniff the air around him. As this feeling inside him, whatever it was, examined his surroundings, Edward suddenly became aware that he could feel more _somethings_ like whatever it was that was approaching, and he wondered why he hadn't noticed them before. The feeling deep within seemed to reach out, rumbling like a great beast.

Hands curled into fists, Edward quickly reeled the feeling back in and forced it down, not knowing what it was, what it meant or wanted to do. He received a growl of displeasure for his efforts from that feeling within.

'**_What- what the hell?_**' he wondered, his eyes darting up to his younger brother and Mrs. Malfoy like they'd be able to see that there's something off about him as clearly as if he had grown horns and claws.

He saw no reaction in either of their eyes however and a second later, Edward was startled once again when a man entered through the dining room door. Sitting stiffly in the chair, Edward's fingernails bit into his palm as he watched the man cross the room and give Mrs. Malfoy a quick kiss on the cheek.

'**_Mr. Malfoy then,_**' Edward concluded, his tense posture relaxing just a bit.

He was right in his assumption, as a moment later, the man turned to him and, in fluent Amestrian, introduced himself as Lucius Malfoy, Narcissa's husband and head of the household. The man took a seat next to his wife and not a moment later, a bounty of food appeared on the table. Nerves back on edge ('_**Damn, stupid new-age alchemy and its constant need to seemingly appear out of nowhere! **_'), Edward tentatively picked up a spoon from the table and stirred the bowl of soup before him. It looked like chicken noodle and the scent of it made his mouth water and his appetite return. As Mrs. Malfoy had previously said, he'd be stuck on light meals until he could handle something heavier. In the past, he would always complain about be stuck with hospital food while everyone else dined on meals that looked extravagant in comparison, but at this point, Edward knew that any food the Malfoys gave him would be heavenly in comparison to the slop served at Azkaban. Sipping the broth of the soup, Edward nearly melted with joy.

The rest of dinner was a quiet affair. There was a brief mention that someone named Bella would be coming back to the manor sometime during the night and would be staying indefinitely, but other than that, not many words were exchanged in-between bites of food. It seemed strange to Edward who could still remember the happy chatter that surrounded him whenever he had dinner at the Hughes' or at Teacher's home, but he was so happy to be eating such delicious soup that he wasn't bothered enough by it to say anything.

After dinner, Alphonse took him on a tour around the manor that got side-tracked once he showed Edward the library. The detour didn't last too long though as Edward's joy at the sight of so many books was quickly squashed once he realized that he couldn't actually read any of them.

"**They're mostly in English,**" Alphonse said, watching as Edward flitted about from shelf to shelf.

"**Do you know English?**" Edward asked as he grabbed a random book and thumbed through the pages, frowning when he couldn't make heads or tails of the language.

"**I know some,**" Alphonse said slowly, looking away. "**Not much though.**"

Looking up from the book at his brother, Edward said, "**Maybe you could help me read some of these sometime?**"

"**Um, sure,**" Alphonse said, sounding unsure. "**I can try.**"

The tour ended with Edward finding out just where his little brother's room was. As Alphonse rummaged around in his dresser in search of some pajamas he could borrow, Edward took the time to look around the room. It was a lot more personalized than the guest room he had been staying in, showing Edward just how long Alphonse had been staying with the Malfoys. There were books and nick-knacks here and there. For some reason there were two brooms in one corner of the room, but the thing that really caught his attention were the pictures on the walls. Every single one of them were moving.

Walking over to one of the pictures, Edward scrutinized it closely.

'**_Looks like ordinary ink to me,_**' he thought as he lifted up a corner of the paper it was printed on to see the back of it. '**_No arrays. They must be under the ink. Perhaps it's a series of looping arrays that's recycling the alchemy's energy so that it keeps running, and the array is just moving the ink around the paper to give off the appearance of a moving image._**'

"**Here, try these on,**" Alphonse said from behind him.

Turning in place, Edward looked down at the pair of black silk pajamas his younger brother was holding out to him and his eyes widened.

"**Are those pants?**" he asked hopefully.

"**Um, yeah,**" Alphonse said hesitantly, and was immediately wrapped up in a hug.

"**Thank you, thank you, thank you, Al! You're the only one with sense around here,**" Edward said, his hug tightening before he pulled away and held his brother at arm's length. "**I mean, if you're going to wear a robe at all, you should wear it like a coat, and people still wear pants when they're wearing coats! At least _sane_ people do.**"

"**Yeah, sure, you're welcome,**" Al said with an awkward half-smile before he thrust the pajamas into his brother's hands. "**Here.**"

"**Right,**" Edward said, wasting no time in pulling the silk pants on under the robe before pulling the robe off completely. As he shook out the silk shirt, it suddenly occurred to him that he was shirtless in front of his brother. Normally something like that wouldn't bother him in the least. Hell, he hadn't even been bothered when he was walking around in only his boxers with Winry there to see. Yet now he suddenly felt self-conscious and it was all because of the red markings painting his body, especially the ouroboros on his shoulder. It was a reminder of what he was, a homunculus whose creator died in the process of making him. As much as he felt like the real Edward Elric, the markings were also a reminder that there was a chance that he was just a cheap copy.

Edward slipped the black night shirt on and, wrapping his arms around himself in a sort of nervous hug, he averted his eyes to the ground. He didn't want Al to have to think of that, and he also didn't want to have to deal with a younger brother who wasn't quite sure if this possibly fake older brother was worth his time.

'**_Maybe that's why he's been kind of distant,_**' Edward thought. '**_Maybe he's already thought about all of this and he isn't quite sure how to act._**'

Eyes drifting over to his pant-legs, noting how they seemed a bit too long, Edward said the first thing that came to mind, "**I can't believe you're still taller than me.**"

"**Guess I just got all the right genes,**" Alphonse remarked.

"**So, what, you're saying I got all the _short_ genes?**" Edward asked heatedly, narrowed eyes shooting up to his brother's face.

Alphonse quirked an eyebrow at him, "**No, I didn't say that at all.**"

Edward eyed him suspiciously for a moment before accepting his response. If there was anyone who could get away with possibly calling him short, it was Alphonse. Apparently deciding that Edward's snappy attitude was due to him being overtired, his younger brother declared that it was time for them to go to bed and led him back to the guest room. Had it been anyone else telling him to go to sleep, like he was a child who couldn't make that decision for himself, Edward would have protested and made the other person's life miserable so that they wouldn't even consider the task of putting him to bed in the near future. But once again, _it was Alphonse_, and even though he was the younger brother, he always seemed to be watching out for Edward.

Back when they had been hunting for the philosopher's stone, Alphonse was always making sure that Edward was eating or sleeping when the older boy was too swept up in research to remember such tasks himself. The fact that Alphonse was still looking out for Edward's best needs, even now that Edward was a homunculus, meant that his younger brother still cared about him and at least held some small belief that he was the real Edward Elric.

It was strange to Edward to be sleeping in a separate room from his little brother, they had been sharing a room for most of their lives, but it seemed that Alphonse wanted it this way, so Edward wasn't going to argue the point. After showing Edward how the alchemically-powered wall lanterns in the room worked ("**Just twist the knob by the door right or left to turn it off or on.**"), Alphonse left him to get some sleep for the night.

The problem with that plan was that he didn't feel sleepy in the slightest. The insane amount of energy he had been feeling when he first woke up had faded to a manageable level, and although the tingly feel was practically gone, at the moment he felt like how he was sure a refreshed and well-rested person felt. He really didn't want to mess up his sleep schedule though, so he decided he should at least lay down and _try_ to get some rest. Dimming the lanterns down to barely nothing, Edward climbed under the covers of his bed and attempted to get some sleep.

It was a noble attempt on his part, but it didn't last long, for as soon as he closed his eyes, surrounded by the darkness of his room, the image of a dementor looming over him flashed before his mind and his eyes snapped open. There of course was no dementor, they were all far away in Azkaban, but it seemed that every time he closed his eyes, he couldn't keep the image out of his head of something menacing sneaking up on him when his eyes were closed.

'**_I'm being ridiculous,_**' Edward thought, squeezing his eyes shut. '**_There's nothing there. I'm fine. I'm safe._**'

Something squeaked faintly to his left, sounding deafening in the absolute silence of the night. Edward bolted upright in bed and clapped, causing the minuscule flames in the lanterns to flare to life, lighting up the room and showing that there was nobody there but him. The flames in the lanterns died back down, enveloping the room in darkness once more, and Edward was left blinking away the spots in his vision that the lights had caused.

He had seen quite clearly that there was nobody else in the room, but he couldn't stop thinking about the dementors and how they had been able to pass through his cell door to get to him. If they could do that, what was to stop them from coming here? If they did come, would there be any way to defend against them, or would he just be a helpless lamb to the slaughter?

Clapping his hands to light up the room again, Edward hopped out of his bed and raced over to hallway door. He turned the knob of the lanterns into the 'on' position and for a moment, just stood by the door, golden eyes taking in everything in the room around him.

'**_I can't believe how paranoid I'm being,_**' he thought to himself, yet didn't turn the lights back off.

Fear curled up in his chest like a slimy, slug-like chimera. With one quick last look around his room, Edward decided that he could sleep just fine with the lights on and slowly approached his bed. He paused a few feet away from the bed when the image of a skeletal dementor hand reaching out from under it to grab hold of his ankle flitted across his mind. He immediately shot down any mental suggestions to check under the bed, arguing with himself that doing so was childish and he wasn't pathetic enough to actually believe that there was something dangerous hiding underneath the mattresses. Quickly closing the distance between him and the bed (He was an alchemist, _damnit_, a homunculus even! He _shouldn't_ have anything to fear!), Edward slipped underneath the blankets and curled up in his side.

He squeezed his eyes shut, but even with the lights on, the image of a dementor or _something_ creeping up on him kept playing through his mind. As much as he tried to force himself to relax, his body remained tense, ready for an attack he was almost sure would never come. The fear within his chest felt as if it was squeezing his insides tight. One eye cracked open and peered around the room again before squeezing shut. Frustrated with himself, Edward pulled the blankets over his head to prevent himself from looking around the room over and over again. Whenever he opened his eyes, he could see only the pattern of the blanket.

Taking deep breaths, he followed the steps his teacher taught him for falling into a meditative state. He must have been doing something right because he could feel his muscles slowly relaxing; the fear within his chest uncurled, releasing its hold, and then...

_He was laying on a cold frozen ground of a dirt road, surrounded by terrified villagers. He should have been able to overcome them easily, but one of them got the drop on him in the form of a shovel to the head, and as the world spun around him, they swarmed upon him like a pack of snarling animals. Suddenly his automail wrist was tied to the support beam of a house's front porch. Several boots were buried into his back and on his legs, pinning him in place as the grown men put all their weight into keeping him down. Another man approached with an axe in hand, and though he was strong and muscular, Edward knew that if given half a chance, he could snap that man like a twig._

_The villagers weren't underestimating him though and that was a problem. They were putting all their strength into keeping him down, doing all they could to take away his defenses._

_"**Sick freak!**"_

_"**Crime against nature!**"_

_"**Murderer!**"_

_No.. He'd learned his lesson after the first time with trying to bring his mother back to life. He_ helped_ people with alchemy. Why couldn't they see that?_

_The axe buried into his automail arm, so close to the port that he could feel his nerves scream out as they were ripped by the force. He bit his lip, holding back his scream, but could stop a tear from trailing down his face. The axe was torn free before it came swinging down again, cutting even deeper into the automail. A few more strong hits and then his automail arm was cut off. He couldn't clap, he couldn't form his instantaneous arrays. Against this many people, he was defenseless._

_"**Let him go!**"_

_Fire exploded overhead and it was a relief._

_But then time skipped ahead, jumping past certain events that took place that day._

_And the fire was no longer a comfort._

_"**No.. No!**"_

_Far ahead of him there were flames._

_Even more fire came flying towards him, riding torches the villagers threw, stones flying in their wake, all of it hitting the chilled surface around him. He was lying on his side, bound with rope and unable to move._

Edward's eyes snapped open, his breathing coming in short, panicked gasps. He tore the blanket off of him, sliding up so that his back rested against the bed's headboard. Golden eyes darted about the room, but there was nobody there but him.

Running a shaking hand through his bangs, he spoke quietly to himself, "**Who says a homunculus needs sleep anyway? We're supposed to be practically immortal, right?**" He took a few quivering breaths, swallowing thickly before he continued, "**I was just tired before because- because I was still... new... and weak, and that prison only made things worse. I'll be fine now. I just... I just won't sleep.**"

He was doubtful about his decision, but he knew he wouldn't be able to get back to sleep for the rest of the night anyway, so he might as well try it out and see if he could go without. If it worked, than his life would just be that much easier.

"**What to do now though?**"

Al would definitely be sleeping by this point and he was really the only one Edward had any interest in talking to or being around, so until his younger brother woke up, he'd have to find out some other way to occupy his time. The first thing he decided to do was take another shower. He was covered in a cold sweat from the nightmare and he really didn't want to be walking around like that for the rest of the night. Thankfully, the pants were still wearable, but the shirt was too moist with sweat to be very comfortable to wear after he got all clean. He supposed he could try to wash it with alchemy, but he didn't have a lot of experience with silk and would probably ruin it.

'**_Suppose I could just wear my robe over my pants, or make a shirt out of the robe,_**' he thought.

The problem with that was that they weren't his clothes, they were Al's (unless there was someone else their age living in the Malfoy's house, but probably not because they didn't come to dinner). Edward really didn't want to go messing up his brother's clothes just because he didn't like robes.

"**How Al can stand them, I'll never know,**" he grumbled to himself.

Walking into the bathroom, it was then that he noticed that the dirty robe he had left on the bathroom floor was gone and the towels from before were now clean and neatly folded up on a shelf. It all reminded him of his encounters with those strange chimeras Al called house elves. He had said they were servants that helped around the house, and apparently they could use alchemy to transport themselves wherever they needed to be. Edward was still wary of them despite Alphonse's promise that they were harmless, so he didn't exactly want to encounter another one face to face. He had a feeling that the odd-looking little chimeras didn't want to meet up with _him_ again anytime soon either, but maybe... they could help him without either of them having to see each other.

Feeling completely ridiculous, Edward spoke out-loud to the empty bedroom, saying, "**Hello... little house elf things, um, I'm going to take a shower now and I'd appreciate it if you could clean my clothes or get me clean ones to change into. I'll just leave them out in the bedroom for you that way you don't have to see me and I don't have to see you.**"

He paused and waited for a moment, almost as if there was going to be some sort of response, and when there was none, he muttered angrily to himself, "**That was stupid. Like they're even going to hear me from wherever it is that they are.**"

Still, when he slipped out of his clothes, he left them in a pile on the bedroom floor before closing the bathroom door on them and locking it for good measure. His eyes avoiding his reflection in the mirror, he turned on the water and quickly stepped into the spray of the shower.

He honestly wasn't expecting anything to come from leaving his clothes on the bedroom floor, so when he exited the bathroom half an hour later, towel wrapped around his waist with alchemy-dried hair only slightly damp, he was surprised to see his clothes all clean and neatly folded up on the bed. A quick scan of the bedroom showed that the chimera servants had long since left, something that he was perfectly fine with. Changing back into his clothes, Edward braided his hair up and after much debate, he pulled the robe on over the pajamas for warmth.

Opening his bedroom door just a crack, one golden eye peered out into the dimly lit hallway to make sure there was nobody out there. Deciding that the coast was clear, Edward stepped out into the hallway, and as soon as he did, the lanterns nearest to him in the hall became brighter. He quickly learned that they were motion-sensitive after a little bit of experimenting which involved crouching, jumping, and trying to sneak by them. After coming to this conclusion, he wandered the hallways in search of some way to kill time.

He eventually ended up back in the library and spent several hours going through its books, trying to figure out this strange _English_ language. When he reached a point of frustration where he wanted to alchemize the pages of the current book he was reading into a fine paste, he decided it'd be best if he took a break from his translation attempts and looked for something else to do.

Back to wandering the halls, he was wondering just how many hours had passed and just how close it was to morning when he felt it. Just like before in the dining room, he became aware of a feeling that there was... _something, somewhere_. It wasn't nearly as strong as the last few somethings he became aware of. He still had no idea what it was, but somehow he could tell that it was close by. Also like before in the dining room, he could feel a shift within his being, like a creature that perked up curiously after catching the scent of something intriguing. This feeling within urged him forward, growling at him to find whatever this thing was.

He ended up in the open doorway of a bedroom. There was nobody inside, but he could tell that someone normally inhabited it. There were clothes strewn about along with books and nick-knacks and vials of liquid. None of that mattered though, all that mattered was finding the source of the _something_.

He stepped into the room, golden eyes darting every which-way. Frowning in concentration, he followed the feeling, both within himself as well as whatever it was that was giving off that strange sensation, that unusual energy. Letting it guide him, he was pulled over to a dresser that had several items arranged on its surface. The feeling inside him seemed to reach out, as if brushing against each object. There was a little ceramic dragon, a set of keys, several coins, vials of colorful liquid, a golden cup with a badger engraved on its surface-

**_There!_** the feeling inside him practically roared. His heart pounded in his chest as the feeling urged him to reach out to the golden cup.

'**_But why a cup?_**' he wondered, hands remaining by his side. '**_What's so special about that?_**'

"What are you doing in my room?" a voice shrieked from behind him, the English words startled him out of a trance he hadn't realized he had been in.

Whipping around in place, the feeling within rumbled at the presence of a _second_ something in the room before Edward pushed it back down. A woman with dark, wild hair stood before him. The dark circles around her eyes as well as her sickly appearance immediately reminded Edward of his own reflection. She gave him a malicious, but calculating stare, and looked to be waiting for a response.

Not understanding the English words, Edward fumbled for something to say, and finally settled on, "**Uh... Sorry, is this your room?**"

Her face twisted into a snarl at his words and she snapped, still in English, "So you're the Dark Lord's new little _pet!_ Taking all his attention away from _Me! I_ was the one he came to break out of that prison, _not you!_ What does he even see in you? You're a scrawny little alley kitten compared to me and my power!"

"**I... don't understand,**" Edward said slowly. Clearly she could see that he didn't understand the language she was speaking, right?

"Yeah, sure, hide behind your gibberish," she hissed. "I'll have to borrow one of those translators from my _oh-so-privileged family_ and let you know just where you stand when it comes to the Dark Lord and myself, and that's beneath us! I'm the one he gave the special assignment to, not you, and I'd appreciate it if you kept your grubby little paws off of it!" with a dramatic sweep of her arm, she pointed to the door. "Now get out!"

Understanding_ that_ gesture, as well as the anger in the woman's voice, Edward darted out of the room. He knew he shouldn't have been poking around in other people's bedrooms in the first place, yet he couldn't help but think, '**_I'll have to sneak back in there another time when she's not around and get a closer look at that cup._**'

He decided to head back to his room and wait out the rest of the night in there, but he had underestimated the sheer size of the manor he was staying in and spent the remaining hours of the night trying to find his way. In the end, Alphonse found him before he managed to find his room.

"**Ah, there you are,**" his younger brother said. "**Sleep well?**"

"**Yeah, I slept great,**" Edward said with a smile, not wanting his brother to worry over a missed night's sleep. "**Just woke up.**"

Nodding at his brother, Alphonse led him down the hall, saying, "**Come on, let's go get breakfast.**"

.

* * *

.

Albus Dumbledore had reason to believe that there were suspicious circumstances surrounding Nicholas Flamel's death and he regretted not investigating it sooner. The Ministry of Magic had a system in place that had a series of spells continuously recording every single little thing the Ministry did (ranging from something as minuscule as a memo being sent from floor three to floor eight, to something as big as a team of Aurors being sent to fend off a dark wizard attack). Each recording was filed away in a fashion that most Ministry officials hardly understood. Considering the massive amount of files, most witches and wizards wouldn't waste their time looking through it.

It was through sheer luck that an acquaintance of Dumbledore's happened to stumble upon a file noting that several Aurors had followed the dark surge of magic, felt by the entire magical community several months ago, straight back to Nicholas Flamel's home. The man who made this particular discovery had, at the time, been looking for something entirely different listed in the files, but he knew an important bit of information when he saw it and was quick to inform Dumbledore of what he found the next time they met.

A bit more digging on the situation revealed that the Ministry had, in fact, conducted an investigation on Flamel's death, and the whole thing was quickly listed as an experimental magical accident. That so-called 'fact' immediately set off warning bells in Dumbledore's head. Flamel was an old friend he knew quite well, and he had learned early on in their friendship that although Nicholas could perform magic, he wasn't nearly powerful enough to perform the type of spell the Ministry claimed had killed him. Where Nicholas lacked in magic, he excelled in alchemy and if it was going to be any sort of experiment at all that killed him, it was going to be an alchemical one.

The second clue Dumbledore received that something was wrong came when he talked to a few of the Aurors that had first gone to Flamel's house upon his death. They each told him the same story, that it was a magical accident, yet when Dumbledore discretely peered into their minds on the subject, he found that their memories had been altered and that certain parts of the night had even been erased completely.

When he went to Minister Fudge on the matter, the other man immediately went on the defensive. Sweating and stumbling over his words, Fudge came up with a quick excuse to get Dumbledore out of his office. For a brief second as he was ushered out of the room, Dumbledore locked eyes with Fudge and within the man's mind, Dumbledore caught a brief flash of red, alchemical markings and a pair of hauntingly golden eyes.

There was most definitely something suspicious going on.

The research Flamel had sent to his office most likely held the answers, but before that, Dumbledore wanted to make sure that nothing important had been left behind at his old friend's house. That's when he found out that some of Flamel's things had been sold off to a pawn shop by some of the man's distant relatives. Being as old as he had been, Flamel's closest family had passed away years before, leaving only distant family members that didn't know him all that well to deal with his belongings.

Which was why Dumbledore was currently standing in a pawn shop inquiring about the items the shop owner had been sold.

"Not a lot left," the shop owner remarked after returning from his search for said items in the backroom. "Most of it was some antique- looking furniture, a few lamps, some dishes and silverware too. There were a few books, but they were all your basic magic textbooks, probably the type of thing you have your students at Hogwarts reading. Still got a few of them here."

The man set down the load of books he held in his arms. Reading over the titles, Dumbledore saw that they were all books on basic magic, first editions that would sell for a good amount, but it wasn't exactly the type of thing he had been hoping to find. Still, he wanted to be sure, so he sifted through the pile of books and quickly flipped through each book's pages just to be sure there wasn't some sort of hidden message.

That's when he saw the Alchemy for Beginners book that Nicholas Flamel had wrote himself. Dumbledore remembered when Flamel had first decided to write the book. It had been not too long after they had first met. Flamel had been saddened by how little knowledge remained on alchemy and that only a few books had survived the fires of the alchemical massacre, so he decided to use his knowledge and create a beginners book for anyone who wanted to learn. The book was fairly well published for something that was considered a dead art, and copies could still be found in circulation in wizarding book stores.

Looking back on it now, Dumbledore always remembered seeing that book on one of Flamel's many bookshelves. At the time, he had always figured Flamel kept a copy as a reminder of his accomplishment of getting a little bit of basic alchemy knowledge back out into the world, but perhaps there was something more to the book.

A thin strip of leather was wound around the book tight, keeping it closed, and as Dumbledore picked up the book, the first thing he noticed was that it felt a lot lighter than it should have for a book so thick. Untying the strip of leather, Dumbledore opened the book and was surprised to see a compartment cut deep into its pages. All those years and what appeared to be just a book was really a hiding spot.

Resting within the compartment of the book were two silver pockets watches, the symbol of a roaring beast on each watches' surface.

.

* * *

_That's the end of this chapter FINALLY! Holy crap, this was a long one, but you guys deserved what with all of your wonderful reviews and me making you wait for so long. I hate to tell you all this, but you're probably going to have another long wait ahead of you until the next chapter because, as I said in the A/N above, the summer semester of college begins for me in two days and I'm going to be swamped for the next four months._

_Just to confirm for you all, yes, the watches Dumbledore found are state alchemist watches. I used the word 'beast' because seriously, what is that? A lion? A dragon? What! _

_And yes, Dumbledore used occlumency or legilimens or whatever it's called to look into a couple of wizards mind, but it was all just a harmless glance to better understand the conspiracy going on around him. Dumbledore's not manipulative or evil in this story, he's just Dumbledore, someone who's just as human as you or me. _

_The woman Edward ran into was of course Bellatrix, and damn is she jealous of him getting Voldy's attention. (Wait. Bellatrix. Bella. Edward and Bella. HA! That just occurred to me. *suddenly realizes the implications and twitches* No way, man. Do not pair. Not in this story or any other story I'll ever write.)_

_EDIT: GAHHH! Epic fail on my part. I messed up the description of the cup and likely mislead a lot of you as to what it was. I was confused when no one recognized the significance of it and when I googled a description, I realized my mistake. I'll post a chapter author's note so that those who have read it know to go back and quickly reread that scene. *facepalms* That's what I get for writing at 5AM.  
_

_Review please and tell me what you think! (and feel free to point our any spelling or grammer errors if you see any so that I can fix them. It's 5AM for me and I'm bound to have missed something)_


	7. Chapter 7

_Hello everyone! The good news is that I've graduated college and I got the whole 'moving-across-the-country' thing all out of the way. The not so great news is that I'm still in the job-hunting process, but whatever, I can still do some writing in between all of that._

_Anyway, in the end of the last chapter, stupid me made a mistake on the description of the cup Ed found in Bellatrix's room. I went back and fixed it, but for clarity's sake, I'm adding a little scene at the beginning of this chapter that has the cup in it. Blah. Whatever. Let's get on with this chapter already!_

_Disclaimer: I don't own Harry Potter and I don't own Fullmetal Alchemist. Don't sue me, I'm poor._

* * *

.

**Chapter Seven**

Dull gold with a badger engraved on its surface. It was nothing special to look at, yet time and time again, Edward found himself returning to the bedroom the cup resided in. His lips pulled down into a frown as the cup glinted teasingly at him. He couldn't understand it, that strange feeling the cup gave off that called to Edward's entire being, beckoning him forward.

It was driving him up the wall, this feeling, this _presence_, and it wasn't just the cup he was sensing it from. There were several others like the cup, yet all different, residing in Malfoy Manor. He could sometimes sense them scuttling about behind walls and beneath floorboards while others drifted from room to room. It took a few days of constantly feeling these somethings, their combined presence clawing at the back of his mind, before he realized that the ones drifting from room to room were in fact coming from the _residents_ of Malfoy Manor.

Alphonse, Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy, the screaming lady he later learned was named Bellatrix, and anyone else who occasionally stopped by the manor, they all radiated this feeling. Edward couldn't understand it, couldn't understand just what it was he was sensing. Whatever it was though, it had an intoxicating pull to it that sang out to him, making him want to get closer, get as close as he could.

Fingers twitching restlessly, his breath occasionally leaving him, Edward resisted the siren's song as best as he could. Save for Alphonse, he barely knew these people. He didn't trust them, especially the screaming one, and he didn't want to get close to them. Thank the Gate for Alphonse though, he was a reprieve from the maddening feeling. In Edward's mind, it was win-win. He could be close to his brother while at the same time satisfy the need to be close to the unexplainable feeling his brother gave off.

There were times though, when a small part of him seemed unsatisfied with simply being near the feeling Alphonse radiated, and during the night, when his younger brother was away in his own room, the _need_ Edward felt returned with a vengeance, making the already difficult night even more impossible to bear. During the night, he was faced with phantom dementors, the ragged claws of sleep digging into his entire being, trying to pull him under, and the resulting nightmares he experienced when he succumbed to such mortal needs. Now, added to all of that was the unholy screech of a need to seek out one of the many strange feelings that clung to the manor's residents.

'_**I need that cup,**_' Edward thought, eyes locked on the golden cup that rested on the mantel across the room.

It was the perfect solution to his problem. If he had the cup, he could carry it on his person and satisfy the unexplainable need he felt. Unfortunately, Bellatrix was very protective of the cup. The strange English words '_Mine_' and '_My special assignment_' were repeated more than once the few times she caught him in her room, hovering around the cup. She also wasn't exactly Edward's biggest fan, if her shouting was anything to go by, and if the cup went missing, he'd probably be her first suspect.

'_**I'll need to create a copy and switch them,**_' Edward decided, giving into the need for just a moment and stepping closer to the cup.

Off in the distance, he could faintly make out the sound of footsteps and sense the strange feeling that accompanied it. Ignoring the pull in his being to go find the owner of the footsteps, Edward stealthily slipped out of the room, deciding to go find Alphonse instead.

.

* * *

.

'_When picked under the light of a full moon, crushed knotgrass can be used to counteract..._'

'_can be used to counteract the effects of..._'

Draco frowned, his quill hovering over his summer potions homework.

'_...counteract the effects of..._'

A single drop of ink dripped onto the parchment. Glaring at the offending ink splatter, Draco kept his eyes locked onto his homework, all too aware of the golden gaze burning a hole into his very soul. He refused to look up though. Looking up would be a form of acknowledgment, it would be encouraging a conversation of some sort that he really didn't feel like having. He had already done his part for the morning. He had greeted Edward in the hall, they'd exchanged pleasantries and small-talk over breakfast, and he even answered Edward's questions as to why he had summer homework he needed to focus on, along with some follow-up questions about Hogwarts. It should have been enough for the day.

But _of course_ it wasn't enough.

'_Think of it like having a younger brother who believes he's your older brother,_' the Dark Lord had told him.

Yeah, _right._

It was more like having a puppy. An extremely _clingy_ puppy.

Honestly though, Draco wasn't quite sure yet what to make of Edward. The tattooed blond was kind of jumpy, flinching at any sudden noise. Sometimes he'd get fidgety, nervous, in which case he'd fall back on what Draco had come to call his 'post-Azkaban obsession.' He'd noticed something similar in his Aunt Bella as well, but he hadn't really made the connection to the wizarding prison until he'd spent some time with Edward and noticed the parallels between their... 'symptoms' if you will.

For his Aunt Bella, it was an obsession with touching and rearranging the small material things around her. If there was a small nick-knack nearby or something else of the sort, she just had to pick it up, fiddle with it in her hands, and then rearrange its position a couple of times once she put it back down. It wasn't something you'd notice about her off-hand, but having his Aunt Bella living in the manor now, Draco had easily picked up on the habit.

For Edward, it was clear that the obsession was with alchemy. The other blond could often be found drawing what Draco later learned to be transmutation circles, one after the other again and again. The same went for actually performing alchemy. There were many times when, while Draco was busy doing something, Edward would sit nearby and transmute something over and over again.

'_Maybe it's a way of distracting himself,_' Draco had theorized on more than one occasion, '_something that Edward can focus on due to its familiarity.__.. Or maybe he's always been this obsessed._'

Whatever the reason behind the obsession was, it was a habit Draco could accept of someone who had been in the company of dementors for an extended period of time. The previously mentioned clinginess though, that was a bit harder to ignore. It had only been a little over a week now and Draco was already getting annoyed with Edward's constant need to be close-by, and when Draco says 'close-by' he doesn't just mean 'in the same room.' No, it quickly became apparent to Draco that Edward seemed to rely on touch. Not in a creepy way, mind you, just something simple like Edward slinging an arm over Draco's shoulder or standing close enough to Draco so that their arms were pressed up against each other. At times, it seemed like the tattooed blond hardly even noticed when he was doing it.

On top of all of that, Edward wasn't sleeping. Oh sure, he _claimed_ he was sleeping every night, but Draco wasn't a moron. He could easily recognize the signs of sleep deprivation, having seen these signs on his classmates in the past. Granted, Edward was kind of loony from the start, so Draco couldn't exactly be sure how much of this was due to not sleeping, but the dark circles around those golden eyes couldn't lie.

He had already approached Edward about the subject, not out of any real concern for the other blond, but more due to a concern for Draco's _own_ safety as well as the safety of his family. His _real_ family. Depriving someone who was already unstable from Azkaban and who was as potentially powerful as Edward of sleep was just a bad idea all around ('potentially' powerful because so far Draco had only seen a small scrap of what Edward could do with alchemy. He was reserving his judgment until he got a better demonstration). His 'older brother' was anything if not stubborn though (as Draco was coming to learn), and he denied having any sleeping problems at all.

In fact, Edward denied having _any_ problems. He would swear to Draco that he was fine, even when it was clear that he wasn't. Draco decided not to fight Edward on the subject though. Not only was it not worth the time or effort, but he also didn't bother because the whole reason behind his mission as 'Alphonse' was to keep Edward happy, and if Edward wanted to pretend that there was nothing wrong, far be it from Draco to tell him otherwise.

"**Edward,**" Draco finally said, unable to take the blond's staring any longer. He set his quill down a bit more forcefully than he meant to and another splatter of ink joined the first on his homework. Finally looking up at the other blond, he asked, "**What is it?**"

'_Why are you staring at me?_' Draco snapped in his mind. '_Merlin's beard! I can't concentrate when you're staring!_'

Edward blinked, as if he hadn't realized he had been staring. Eyes narrowing, his staring became more focused, and he said with a small frown on his face, "**You're different.**"

Draco faltered. Was that it then? Barely two weeks into his mission and he had already screwed it up? He supposed that he should count himself lucky that Edward had bought his act as 'little brother' for even this long considering that he barely knew a thing about Alphonse. Not that it mattered though as the Dark Lord would only see this as a failure on Draco's part and do who knows what to him.

Palms sweating, Draco did the only thing he could think of.

Deny, deny, deny.

"**I don't know what you're talking about,**" he said.

Somehow encouraged by Draco's response, Edward rushed forward into an explanation.

"**You're different from everyone else, who are also all different from one another,**" he said, his golden eyes growing bright as he spoke. "**And I don't mean a physical difference. Of _course_ you all _look_ different. I mean the feeling you all give off is what's different from each other.**"

Now it was Draco's turn to stare. And blink. And stare some more.

"**Now I _really_ don't know what you're talking about,**" he said, giving Edward a dubious look.

"**Sorry, I'm rambling,**" Edward said. He suddenly began laughing, and just as suddenly stopped. "**I didn't tell you? I meant to tell you, but I must not have.**"

"**Tell me what, Edward?**" Draco asked carefully.

"**It's nothing. It's fine. I'm _fine,_ Al,**" Edward said. Grabbing one of the pieces of parchment he had scribbled a transmutation circle on, he began to absentmindedly tear at the edges. "**It's just this feeling that I keep feeling, but not _physically_ feeling, and not 'feeling' in the way that it's an emotional feeling,**" he stopped to laugh again. "**But that doesn't make sense... Sense. I'm sensing it, you could say? Yes. That's it. It's more like an extra sense different from something like sight or smell. And I'm sensing this feeling, from you, from the Malfoys and Bellatrix and that _damn_ cup.**"

Wait, a cup? Draco was beginning to wonder if this was the sleep deprivation talking. His fellow Slytherins had said some pretty weird things when they were running on no sleep too.

"**And I _want_ - no, that's not important... But I'm fine Al, alright?**" Edward said, giving Draco a stern look as if trying to will him to believe so.

"**Yeah, Edward, I know,**" Draco said, holding back a sigh and being careful to keep the exasperation out of his voice.

Edward was silent for a moment, staring at Draco as if judging the truth in his words, before continuing on, "**Anyway, these feelings you guys are giving off, I've just started noticing that they're different from each other. Well, they're all similar, like it's all the same thing, but at the same time they're all different. Individual... like.. like,**" he struggled to find the words. "**Like a signature or something.**"

The Dark Lord had said he wanted to be informed of anything strange or magical Edward did, and while this definitely fell into the category of 'strange,' Draco wasn't so sure he should send off a report for his father to give the Dark Lord just yet. After all, if this turned out to just be an addition to Edward's delusions due to lack of sleep, Draco didn't want to waste the Dark Lord's time with pointless information that might piss the dark wizard off. No, he'd wait a bit. Maybe if he could get Edward to get some sleep, the other blonde would be more sound of mind and Draco could question him on the subject again. If it did turn out to be something, he'd send his report then.

'_How would I get him to go to sleep though?_' Draco wondered. He honestly didn't have a clue. From what he'd heard from his parents, magic wouldn't work, and Edward was far too stubborn to just go to sleep when he was told. '_Maybe a potion?_'

"**I don't know what to tell you, Edward,**" Draco said, responding to everything Edward had just said to him.

Edward chuckled a little and said with a small smile, "**It's fine. I don't even quite understand it myself.**"

Thinking that the conversation was, for the most part, over, Draco picked up his quill and turned back to his homework. He was only able to write out one word before Edward's exaggerated groan interrupted his concentration.

"**Come on! You've been writing all day,**" Edward griped. "**I usually have no problem with research, you know that Al, but there's nothing here for me to do.**"

"**Sure there is. You can draw more of your transmutation circles,**" Draco said, attempting to reason with the other blond.

"**For what purpose though?**" Edward asked. "**Before, we always had some sort of goal in mind for alchemy, some drive to inspire us, to keep us working.**" Resting both hands on one of the arrays he drew, the complex circle crackled with blue electricity before forming into a paper flower. "**There's no direction now, and I've been drawing arrays all week. I'm not used to this much... inactivity!**"

"**Edward,**" Draco groaned. "**I need to get this assignment done. I've got this and a bunch of other assignments I need to get done before the summer's over with and I'd like to get it out of the way now.**"

"**Homework.. For that hog school that teaches you alchemy,**" Edward said, basically summarizing what Draco had previously told him about.

"**'Hogwarts',**" Draco corrected him, "**but yes.**"

"**You don't need lessons in alchemy, Al,**" Edward said, frowning. "**Not from some dumb school.**"

"**It's that new-age alchemy stuff, it's different,**" Draco said stubbornly.

"**You know, you still haven't taught me about any of this new-age alchemy,**" Edward said.

"**Yes, because I've been busy,**" Draco said, nearly snapping at his 'brother' as he gestured at his homework, "**trying to do my homework like I'm trying to do... now... _damnit._**"

"**What, what is it?**" Edward asked, following Draco's gaze down to the piece of parchment he was looking at, but apparently not seeing anything wrong with it.

But _of course_ he wouldn't see anything wrong with it, aside from the baffling content, because Draco had written the entire thing in Edward's language. Between having the spelled bracelet on and occasionally talking to Edward while writing out his Potions homework, Draco hadn't even realized that he wasn't writing the thing in English. He'd have to re -write the whole thing before he passed it in, and it didn't look like it'd be a good idea to do so while Edward was around and being distracting, least he write everything out in the foreign language all over again.

"**It's nothing,**" Draco responded with a defeated sigh. "**Just a content error. I'll have to re-do what I wrote... later.**"

Edward perked up, asking, "**Later? Meaning...?**"

"**Meaning not right now,**" Draco said as he stacked the useless pieces of parchment up, not caring that the ink from the different pages was bleeding together. It'd look horribly messy, but he'd be able to read the words later and that was all that mattered. Deciding that he didn't want to end up in another situation with Edward staring him down as he did something the tattooed blond saw as a waste of time, Draco asked, "**So what do you want to do for the rest of the day?**"

He was almost afraid to know.

Looking a little taken aback, Edward said with a shrug, "**Well, I dunno. Something that doesn't involve us sitting around for the rest of the day.**"

Before Draco could even begin to come up with some sort of activity that could occupy their time, Edward's eyes lit up with an idea.

"**Sparring!**"

'_I'm sorry, what?_" Draco questioned in his mind.

Sparring... as in physically fighting each other without wands or magic? Like _muggles?_

"**No,**" Draco said automatically.

His opinion on the subject apparently didn't matter though because Edward had already gotten a hold of his arm and was dragging him up from the bed where they had been sitting.

"**Ah, come on Alphonse, it'll be great!**" Edward said enthusiastically. "**We haven't sparred at all since I got here and Gate knows we both need it. We're out of practice and out of shape.**"

"**I am not out of shape!**" Draco said, offended. Pulling his arm from Edward's grip, he stood his ground and said, "**I participate in sports at school. I'm very much in-shape!**"

Edward gave him a once-over before raising his eyebrows doubtfully.

"**Please, you're as noodly as I am,**" he said, unconvinced of Draco's physical prowess. To further emphasize his point, he grabbed on of Draco's arms by the wrist and flopped it about in the air. "**See? Noodly.**"

Draco snatched his arm back once again, but no matter how many stern looks he threw the other blond, Edward would not be swayed on the matter.

"**Come on. Let's change out of these damn robes into something we can actually move in and then head outside.**"

Before Draco could get out another word of protest, Edward raced off to his own room to change.

"Bollocks."

.

* * *

.

'_I guess it could be a good way to tire him out and get him to go to sleep,_' Draco thought to himself as he walked with Edward outside to some place where they could do... whatever sort of fighting this sparring thing involved. He honestly had no idea.

They were both dressed in a t-shirt and pants, and even though Draco had dressed this way plenty of times at school, he couldn't help but feel odd being dressed without a robe at his home of all places where his parents were around. Out of the corner of his eye, Draco saw Edward occasionally tug the short sleeves of his t-shirt down, as if trying to hide the red markings on his arms. It appeared that Draco wasn't the only one who felt a little off with their current attire, although it was for different reasons. They were both too stubborn to admit it though.

Coming to stand in a nice, open grassy area on the manor's grounds, Draco turned to Edward and asked, "**Now what?**"

"**We do warm-ups, or course,**" Edward said, already doing some sort of stretching exercise.

Draco supposed that made sense for any overly physical activity. For Quidditch, there too was a little bit of stretching involved before practice or a game, but the real warm-ups involved flying on a broom. Not really knowing what he was doing in the case of sparring, Draco just followed Edward's lead and copied what the other blond did. Eventually losing count of just how long they spent stretching, by the time Edward stopped, Draco already felt ready to call it a day. He was tired and a little achy from the stretching and he couldn't believe Edward wanted to keep going.

'_Isn't he supposed to be the one getting tired?_' Draco thought, wiping sweat from his brow.

"**So what, do we just...**" Draco balled his hands into fists and made a couple of limp swinging motions in the air, "**..start?**"

"**Yup, and no holding back, Alphonse,**" Edward said, bouncing energetically from foot to foot. "**No alchemy either. Like, _really_ no alchemy. We're both using different kinds now and since yours doesn't work on me, it'd hardly be fair.**"

"**Alright,**" Draco said, and it was as if he had instead shouted '**go!**'

Suddenly Edward was racing towards him, and in moves too quick for Draco to follow, the young Slytherin quickly found himself on the ground with a couple new aches to add to his collection and a confused tattooed blond standing over him.

"**You weren't even trying,**" Edward said, sounding baffled. "**What's up? You never go _that_ easy on me, not even when I was recovering from surgery.**"

"**Not going easy on you,**" Draco said with a wince. "**Just not... remember as much about sparring as I thought I did.**"

"**Well, how much do you remember?**" Edward asked as he held out a hand to help Draco up.

"**Umm... next to nothing,**" Draco admitted with a sheepish shrug as he grabbed Edward's hand and pulled himself up.

"**Jeez, Al, you should have said something sooner. I could have really hurt you.**"

'_Yeah... _Could have_ hurt me,_' Draco thought with a grimace.

"**I guess I'll just have to re-teach everything to you,**" Edward said, as if it was a simple solution.

"**Can't we just go back inside?**" Draco groaned, wilting where he stood.

"**You can't _not_ know how to defend yourself, Al,**" Edward said. "**If you lose that alchemy stick thing of yours, you'd be screwed. Now stand up straighter and raise your arms up. We're going to go over the basics first.**"

For the next several hours, Edward taught him about sparring. They practiced stances and balance before moving on to the basics of striking, kicking, and blocking an attack. Draco honestly hadn't thought he'd pick up on anything Edward taught him when the other blond first started the lesson, but there was so much repetition to each move Edward showed him that he actually found some of it sticking. Before he knew it, the lesson had ended and they were both collapsed out on the ground, almost feeling too exhausted to move. The once neat grass was now torn and scuffed up, revealing patches of dirt which Draco was sure that the house elves would have fixed by the end of the day.

"**This was nice,**" Edward said quietly after a long stretch of silence. "**Almost like we're back in-**" a scratchy-hissing noise replaced Edwards words for just a second, but the other blond continued on, apparently not noticing it at all as he said, "**and everything's normal... Well, as normal as things get for us.**"

Edward smiled at Draco, and all the Slytherin could think about was how some of the tattooed blond's words had been cut off with that noise. Censored... On purpose, he was sure. He doubted that the translator bracelets would be malfunctioning since it was the Dark Lord himself that had spelled them up. He knew that he should leave it be, that apparently there were some words the Dark Lord didn't want him hearing, and that it wasn't his place to know what those words were.

'_But what if he asks me a question that requires me to use the word I can't hear him saying? Knowing would just be for the good of the mission,_' Draco reasoned with himself.

For the good of the mission and not at all for the good of satisfying his own curiosity... Alright, so it was a bit of a stretch. In all honesty, if the situation ever came up, he could just give Edward the usual 'I don't remember' answer.

Yet although he knew this, he still found himself opening his mouth and asking, "**Edward... How do you spell the name of that place?**"

"**Huh? You mean-**" and again, the hissing noise filtered over whatever it was that Edward said.

"**Yeah,**" Draco said, sitting up in the grass.

Giving Draco a confused smile, Edward sat up himself and wrote the word out in a patch of dirt as he spelled it out loud, "**A-m-e-s-t-r-i-s.**"

"**Amestris,**" Draco read out loud, and judging by the smile on Edward's face, he thankfully pronounced it right. "**Was that the town we lived in?**"

The smile on Edward's face dropped as he said, "**No, it was our country. Risembool was the town we lived in... at least for a while. You... you really don't remember any of this?**"

"**There's a lot I don't remember, Edward,**" Draco said bluntly.

There was a brief pause as Edward seemed to think something over. Then, with a new look of determination on his face, similar to the one he got when he declared that he would teach Draco how to spar, Edward said, "**Then I'll just have to tell you about everything you've forgotten.**"

For once, Draco wasn't going to argue because this was the perfect way to learn about Edward's past which would mean learning about _Alphonse's_ past. If he could know more about the person he was supposed to be, he could play the role better. Voicing his agreement to Edward's plan, Draco laid back in the patchy grass and listened to Edward talk about his past with his younger brother.

Edward told him about life in Risembool, about his friends, about a strong-willed girl named Winry. He told Draco about his parents, about how his father left them at a young age (or rather, left Edward and the _real_ Alphonse), but that he later discovered that his father had his reasons (reasons he didn't tell Draco). He told Draco about the death of his mother, and for a while, he was quiet.

When he began speaking again, he told Draco about how they went to stay with Winry and her grandmother off and on (apparently Winry also lost her parents, though Edward didn't say how). He told Draco how they later found someone to teach them more about alchemy. Izumi Curtis, and when Edward told Draco the stories about her, the young Slytherin couldn't help but feel thankful that there wasn't a teacher like her at Hogwarts.

From there, Edward's stories got kind of scattered. He talked about some people that they later met who worked in the military (because apparently Amestris was a military-run country). He said that some of them became good friends to the two brothers, but beyond that he didn't say much more.

There were pieces missing from Edward's story, Draco could tell, but he wasn't about to push the subject. Instead, he suggested that they both head inside and take a quick shower to wash all the sweat and grime off before they had to be ready for dinner. Climbing to their feet, both wincing from their aches and pains, the two trudged back inside.

"**Teacher would've kicked our asses for being so out of shape,**" Edward said with a chuckle.

Draco cringed at the thought of it, not seeing how that was very funny at all.

.

* * *

.

Edward looked ready to drop into a coma, yet rather then go off to his room where he could sleep, he lingered in the doorway of Draco's bedroom. Draco watched him from the corner of his eye, not understanding how the other blond was even still standing when Draco himself felt ready to collapse. Edward had been awake practically all week, Draco was sure of it. He looked like he was about to unravel at any second, but even though night had fallen long ago and it was well past time for them both to go to bed, Edward made no move to leave for his own room.

"**Well, goodnight,**" Draco finally said with a sigh, gesturing for Edward to take his leave.

It was as Draco watched the other blond nod, a nervous look in his eyes, and hesitantly shuffle out the bedroom door, that he realized what the problem was. It wasn't that Edward _couldn't_ sleep, it was that, for whatever reason, he didn't _want_ to sleep. Even if Edward went back to his own room where his bed was, Draco was almost positive that he wouldn't sleep.

So what could he do? Exercising and tiring Edward out that way didn't really work. He didn't have a sleeping potion of any sort on hand that he could slip the other blond. So then what?

His eyes fell on his Potions textbook that was still lying open on his bed from when he tried to do his homework that morning. His mind recalled every single History of Magic class he's ever had with Professor Binns droning voice.

"**Hey, Edward!**" he called down the hall after the retreating blond. Edward stopped and threw a curious look over his shoulder at Draco. "**I'm not feeling all that tired myself just yet,**" he practically had to force down a yawn as he lied. "**If you want, I figured before bed, I could teach you a little something about the new aged alchemy.**"

Edward smiled tiredly but happily and said, "**Yeah, sure, Alphonse.**"

Setting aside all of his homework from before, but keeping the Potions book in hand, Draco settled down on his bed, propped up against some pillows piled up by the headboard. Edward followed suit, taking a seat next to Draco and curiously eyeing the Potions book Draco had opened up on his lap.

"**That's all in English,**" Edward pointed out. "**I thought you said you couldn't understand English?**"

"**I said I know some,**" Draco reminded him. "**I know enough to understand this and translate it, but not enough to actually read out the words in English.**"

"**Alright, so what are we learning?**" Edward asked.

"**They call it 'potions.' It's like... cooking,**" Draco explained. "**You mixed a bunch of ingredients in a particular way and you get something from it.**"

"**Sounds exactly like alchemy,**" Edward said, seeming to relax a bit more against the pillows.

"**Well, there's no transmutation circles involved,**" Draco said as he flipped through the pages of the book to find a good starting place.

"**Still more like alchemy then that weird stick waving alchemy,**" Edward murmured and Draco just hummed in agreement.

Deciding on a chapter, Draco began reading in the most low and calm voice he could muster, "**Fill the cauldron up with two and three fourths cup of water. Begin heating the water on a low flame.**"

"**Cauldron?**" Edward asked with a quiet snicker.

"**That's just what it says in the book,**" Draco said, rolling his eyes before continuing, "**Chop up freshly picked mint leaves and stir in counter-clockwise three times...**"

He continued on like this, reading out every single instruction for the potion in a calm, but droning voice. There were a few instances where Edward would stop and question him about an unusual ingredient such as dragon's blood, but once Draco told him that that was just a name for a certain part of a certain type of plant, the other blond stayed quiet.

But he also stayed awake, and soon Draco was fighting off sleep himself as he read through potion number five for the night. Just as Draco was beginning to think that this was a dumb idea that clearly wasn't working, he felt a sudden weight slump against him. Pausing mid-sentence, Draco looked down to see Edward leaning against his side, completely fast asleep. Shifting Edward over so that he was instead lying against the pillows, Draco laid back against the pillows himself with a quiet sigh.

'_About bloody time._'

.

* * *

_ End of this chapter! Why wasn't the word '__Risembool_' c_ensored, you might ask? It's because Edward never mentioned Risembool to Voldemort (BTW, if I'm spelling Risembool wrong, I apologize, but google gave me three different ways to spell it). And just in case there's any questions about it, this is a gen fic, meaning no romance (aside from canon stuff like Mr. and Mrs. Malfoy, but even that would be brief). Just friendships in the future of this story people._

_Anyhow, sorry for the delay. I would have gotten this out sooner today if the sun hadn't decided to blast 105 degrees down on me and heat up my room. I had to make an emergency fan run to keep from melting in this damn hot box. Wish I could have gotten an AC unit, but I don't have the strength or the ability to install one (plus the screens of my windows are screwed into the window frame), AND I live on the 6th floor. Can't you just visualize that horror? An AC unit falling 6 stories and landing on some poor unsuspecting passerby. I didn't even want to risk it._

_Yay digression!_

_Review please and tell me what you think!_


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